putting aside for the moment his search for the loft-worker, he devoted himself to the Bottler and Dahl.
With the sure instinct of his Mulberry Street caste, O’Farrell opened negotiations with Dahl. He knew the latter to be the dangerous angle, and began by placing the muzzle of his own pistol against that marauder’s back.
“Make a move,” said he, “and I’ll shoot you in two.”
The sophisticated Dahl, realizing fate, moved not, and with that the painstaking O’Farrell collected his armament.
Next the Bottler was ordered to come forth. The Bottler obeyed in a sweat and a tremble. He surrendered his pistol at word of the law, and O’Farrell led both off to jail. The two were charged with Disturbance.
In the station house, and on the way, Dahl ceased not to threaten the Bottler’s life.
“This pinch’ll cost a fine of five dollars,” said Dahl, glaring round O’Farrell at the shaking Bottler. “I’ll pay it, an’ then I’ll get square wit’ youse. Once we’re footloose, you won’t last as long as a drink of whiskey!”
The judge yawningly listened, while O’Farrell told his tale of that disturbance.
“Five an’ costs!” quoth the judge, and called the next case.
The Bottler returned to Suffolk Street, Dahl sought Twist, while O’Farrell again took the trail of the loft-worker.
Dahl talked things over with Twist. There was but one way: the Bottler must die. Anything short ‘of blood would unsettle popular respect for Twist, and without that his leadership of the Eastmans was a farce.
The Bottler’s killing, however, must be managed with a decent care for the conventionalities. For either Twist or Dahl to walk in upon that offender and shoot him to death, while feasible, would be foolish. The coarse extravagance of such a piece of work would serve only to pile needless difficulties in the pathway of what politicians must come to the rescue. It was impertinences of that character which had sent Monk Eastman to Sing Sing. Eastman had so far failed as to the proprieties, when as a supplement to highway robbery he emptied his six-shooter up and down Forty-second Street, that the politicians could not save him without burning their fingers. And so they let him go. Twist had justified the course of the politicians upon that occasion. He would not now, by lack of caution and a reasonable finesse, force them into similar peril. They must and would defend him; but it was not for him to render their labors too up-hill and too hard.
Twist sent to Williamsburg for his friend and ally, Cyclone Louie. The latter was a bull-necked, highly muscled individual, who was a professional strong man – so far as he was professionally anything – and earned occasional side-show money at Coney Island by bending iron bars about his neck and twisting pokers into corkscrews about his brawny arms.
Louie, Twist and Dahl went into council over mutual beer, and Twist explained the imperative call for the Bottler’s extermination. Also, he laid bare the delicate position of both himself and Dahl.
In country regions neighbors aid one another in bearing the burdens of an agricultural day by changing work. The custom is not without what one might call gang imitation and respect. Only in the gang instance the work is not innocent, but bloody. Louie, having an appreciation of what was due a friend, could not do less than come to the relief of Twist and Dahl. Were positions reversed, would they not journey to Williamsburg and do as much for him? Louie did not hesitate, but placed himself at the disposal of Twist and Dahl. The Bottler should die; he, Louie, would see to that.
“But when?”
Twist, replying, felt that the thing should be done at once, and mentioned the following evening, nine o’clock. The place should be the Bottler’s establishment in Suffolk Street. Louie, of whom the Bottler was unafraid and ignorant, should experience no difficulty in approaching his man. There would be others present; but, practiced in gang moralities, slaves to gang etiquette, no one would open his mouth. Or, if he did, it would be only to pour forth perjuries, and say that he had seen nothing, heard nothing.
Having adjusted details, Louie, Twist and Dahl compared watches. Watches? Certainly. Louie, Twist and Dahl were all most fashionably attired and – as became members of a gang nobility – singularly full and accurate in the important element of a front, videlicet, that list of personal adornments which included scarf pin, ring and watch. Louie, Dahl and Twist saw to it that their timepieces agreed. This was so that Dahl and Twist might arrange their alibis.
It was the next evening. At 8.55 o’clock Twist was obtrusively in the Delancey Street police station, wrangling with the desk sergeant over the release of a follower who had carefully brought about his own arrest.
“Come,” urged Twist to the sergeant, “it’s next to nine o’clock now. Fix up the bond; I’ve got a date over in East Broadway at nine-thirty.”
While Twist stood thus enforcing his whereabouts and the hour upon the attention of the desk sergeant, Dahl was eating a beefsteak in a Houston street restaurant.
“What time have youse got?” demanded Dahl of the German who kept the place.
“Five minutes to nine,” returned the German, glancing up at the clock.
“Oh, t’aint no such time as that,” retorted Dahl peevishly. “That clock’s drunk! Call up the telephone people, and find out for sure.”
“The ‘phone people say it’s nine o’clock,” reported the German, hanging up the receiver.
“Hully gee! I didn’t think it was more’n halfpast eight!” and Dahl looked virtuously corrected.
While these fragments of talk were taking place, the Bottler was attending to his stuss interests. He looked pale and frightened, and his hunted eyes roved here and there. Five minutes went by. The clock pointed to nine. A slouch-hat stranger entered. As the clock struck the hour, he placed the muzzle of a pistol against the Bottler’s breast, and fired twice. Both bullets pierced the heart, and the Bottler fell – dead without a word. There were twenty people in the room. When the police arrived they found only the dead Bottler.
O’Farrell recalled those trade differences which had culminated in the charge of disturbance, and arrested Dahl.
“You ain’t got me right,” scoffed Dahl.
And O’Farrell hadn’t.
There came the inquest, and Dahl was set free. The Bottler was buried, and Twist and Dahl sent flowers and rode to the grave.
The law slept, a bat-eyed constabulary went its way, but the gangs knew. In the whispered gossip of Gangland every step of the Bottler’s murder was talked over and remembered. He must have been minus ears and eyes and understanding who did not know the story. The glance of Gangland turned towards the Five Points. What would be their action? They were bound to avenge. If not for the Bottler’s sake, then for their own. For the Bottler had been under the shadow of their protection, and gang honor was involved. On the Five Points’ part there was no stumbling of the spirit. For the death of the Bottler the Five Points would exact the penalty of blood.
Distinguished among the chivalry of the Five Points was Kid Pioggi. Only a paucity of years – he was under eighteen – withheld Pioggi from topmost honors. Pioggi was not specifically assigned to avenge the departed Bottler. Ambitious and gallantly anxious of advancement, however, he of his own motion carried the enterprise in the stomach of his thoughts.
The winter’s snow melted into spring, spring lapsed into early summer.
