Dreams Bigger Than the Night (26 page)

As Jay pulled out his wallet, he intended to show surprise at the absence of the ownership slip, but when he saw the cop eyeing his cash, he peeled off a fiver, folded it in half, and put the license inside. The cop never uttered a word as he pocketed the money.

“What’s the best way to get to 334 Sixteenth Street?”

The cop said, “Follow me, I’m goin’ off duty and headin’ to that end of town.” Jay slid in behind the wheel. Ten minutes later, they found themselves passing shops with German names—Helmick’s Bakery, Stoskopf’s Shoe Repair, Meyerhof’s Hardware—and at the intersection of Fond du Lac, Center, and Twenty-Seventh Street, the cop pointed Jay in the right direction. When Jay asked about small hotels in the area, the cop suggested the Decatur, told Jay how to find it, and drove off with a friendly wave.

The hotel, a small place two doors away from the Wittenberg Tavern, greeted Jay in the person of Francis Glenn Irwin, a bald, bespectacled doctor, who subsequently explained that keeping an inn could make him more money than working as a physician. Jay had to admit that it gave him some comfort to think that if he took ill here, he would have someone on the premises who could attend to him immediately. Doc, as Jay and the other five guests called him, had extremely large hands, a cherubic ashy face, and a shuffling gait. The sawbones never seemed in a hurry, even when a neighbor would come to the hotel and ask him to assist with a birth or emergency in the neighborhood. His wife, a dark-haired, frail retiring woman, had a slight squint. Generous and gracious people, they apologized for lodging Jay on the second floor in the back room, the only vacancy, overlooking a tenement building that, Dr. Irwin said discreetly, “occasionally provides views that are not for genteel eyes.”

Before dinner, Jay walked around the neighborhood, composed mostly of white bungalows on small, well-maintained lots, probably no deeper than forty or fifty feet. Stopping at the Wittenberg for a shot of Scotch with a free glass of beer as a chaser, he stayed long enough to have a meal. The liquor culture and German influence were much in evidence. A young woman in Tyrolean dress plucked a zither using the fingers of one hand and a plectrum with the other, while a waiter in a long white apron served sauerbraten with the suds, and a few lively people danced the polka. He heard more German spoken than English and saw several men reading the
Deutsche Zeitung
. From an adjoining booth, he overheard two guys expressing opinions of the kind that had inspired Longie to send his boys to break up Bund meetings with baseball bats.

“If we had a Hitler, instead of a Roosevelt, this Depression would have been over a long time ago. Just look at all the Jews in FDR’s cabinet.”

“They belong in concentration camps. If we could round them up, and all the pansies and Communists, we’d have this country on the road to recovery.”

“Amen.”

Jay paid for his meal and slipped out the restaurant without voicing his anger. Back at the hotel, he went directly to his room and sat down on his coffin-sized bed with its hammock mattress to ponder strategy. With only the name Reinhard Gehrig to go on, he decided to cruise by the house to see if the Waterhouse was parked nearby. Doc Irwin gave him a key to the front door, and he clambered into his car. Creeping slowly down Sixteenth Street past number 334, he saw nothing untoward—no car, no bodies, no clues. Step number two: call the house. His watch indicated a few minutes past eight. Although his mother told him never to call anyone after eight o’clock, he figured he could bend her rule. Driving to a gas station, he told the attendant to fill her up, eased himself into the outside telephone booth, and called the Gehrig house. A woman with a German accent answered.

“Mrs. Gehrig?”

“Yes?”

“I hope you’re the person I want. I’m a friend of Arietta Magliocco’s. She gave me your number. I’m passing through town and thought I would call. I hoped you could tell me her whereabouts.”

“It’s late! You have the wrong number,” she said abruptly and hung up.

(Mom, you were right.)

He returned to the hotel. Before turning off the light, he began to reread Bernard Shaw’s
Major Barbara
, a fitting play for difficult times. But his mind kept wandering. The woman on the phone had acknowledged her name, but had she told him the truth? The Maglioccos were most likely hiding at her house. For a moment, he wished that he could just barge into number 334, look around, and make his escape with Arietta and Piero. He kicked himself for not acting as if he knew Arietta was there and just asking Mrs. Gehrig to call her to the phone. Too late now.

The next morning, arriving before seven, he waited outside 334 Sixteenth Street. When a man left, he followed him to a hunting goods store around the corner from the Schwabenhof Restaurant, on Twelfth and Teutonia. The shop had the usual kinds of mounted wall displays: antlered deer and elk, stuffed fish, photographs of hunters standing next to a fallen bear, and anglers standing on a boat surrounded by their catch. Two things caught his eye. The first was a framed photograph of an older woman who resembled the picture he had seen in the Magliocco house of Arietta’s mother. Surely this was the third sister, Agna. The second was a document taped to the cash register certifying that Mr. Reinhard Gehrig Jr. was a member of the Friends of the New Germany. The dwarfish round-faced fellow in attendance wore an ill-fitting faded brown seersucker suit that had seen too many washings.

“Yes?” the little man asked dourly, tugging at his lapels.

“I’d like to speak to Mr. Gehrig.”

“He’s currently on the phone.”

A minute later, a door at the end of the shop opened and a balding martinet, with a paunch and bespectacled colorless eyes, entered, presumably Mrs. Gehrig’s son.

“Frumpf,” ordered the martial voice, flecked with a German accent, “the toilet is blocked again. See to it.”

Mr. Frumpf said deferentially, “Sir, this gentleman wants a word with you.”

Mr. Gehrig, peremptory and probably no more than twenty-five, was already losing the muscle tone in his face, which had begun to sag. His bulbous lips reminded Jay of some Negro horn players. From his pasty face, the incipient Nazi removed his thick-lensed glasses and said brusquely, “Yes?”

“I’m interested in a pistol, but I don’t know how to go about selecting one. I figured it’s always best to talk to an expert . . . about guns and politics.”

Mr. Gehrig scrutinized Jay as if taking his measure and replied, “How right you are,” and then asked, “You German?”

“Wagner. My parents come from Hamburg.”

“Mine from Stuttgart. If you like, you can call me Reinhard.”

With this information, Jay decided to take a chance. “My parents live in Newark. They knew a woman from Stuttgart, a Kristina Magliocco. If I recall correctly, they said she died young, leaving a daughter.”

Mr. Gehrig again removed his glasses, wiped them, adjusted them to his nose, and said indifferently, “I don’t know the name.”

From his wallet, Jay removed his New Jersey membership card for the Friends and placed it on the counter. Mr. Gehrig reached for it tentatively as if it might bite, and then visibly relaxed. A smile played around his lips.

“You didn’t say . . . Mr. Wagner.”

“One can’t be too safe.”

“Exactly! But why do you ask about her?”

“We used to attend Friends meetings in Irvington.”

“That explains why you chose to be so indirect.”

“In our business . . .” Jay deliberately broke off.

“Yes, secrecy never betrays.”

Fearing that they were wandering from the subject, Jay continued. “Now about Arietta . . .”

Mr. Gehrig reflected briefly and then said, “My cousin.
Ach
, such a beautiful girl. She’s visiting.”

“Is there any chance of my seeing her?”

“Impossible, she’s preparing to go to California.”

“I trust Mr. Magliocco will be accompanying her.”

“Of course. Such a close family.”

“You wouldn’t happen to know her Friends contact in California?” Jay said casually, pretending to be knowledgeable about such matters.

“You’d have to ask my mother. But she and I are at odds.”

Desperate, Jay took a shot in the dark. “With Mr. M.’s interests, I’d guess Southern California.”

Mr. Gehrig laughed heartily, the first time he had done so. “You are so right! Movies and gangsters. It all fits, doesn’t it?”

“Like a tailored suit.”

Hoping to encounter Arietta, Jay expressed an interest in meeting with the Friends the next day. “If so, where?”

Reinhard opened a small black book and studied it. “Why don’t we plan to have dinner around the corner, at the Schwabenhof. Say around eight. I’ll bring along some friends, for the
gemütlichkeit
.”

“Bring Arietta. It will be wonderful to see her again. Tell her Mr. Wagner sends his regards . . . Richard Wagner.”

How dumb could he be? At that moment it struck him that she might well remember that name as the one he’d used to join the Friends.

“I’ll ask.”

“On second thought, don’t. It’s best to keep our contacts to a minimum . . . until the new order . . . but you understand.”

“Not a word,” Reinhard said and grinned as if they had just entered into a vast conspiracy.

“What do you need a pistol for, Mr. Wagner?”

“Protection. Prowlers and that sort of thing.”

“Then I recommend the model P-35 Browning. It’s a military pistol, made in Belgium. First-rate.”

Jay purchased the gun, exchanged pleasantries with Mr. Gehrig, and started for the front door. Had Jay left a minute or two earlier, he wouldn’t have seen the man approaching the shop. Through the window he recognized Cauliflower. Placing his package on the floor, he bent down and tied his shoelaces as Rolf Hahne entered and walked past him. Jay quickly left. His hands were shaking and his head spinning, so he went around the corner for a beer at the Schwabenhof. As he sipped the bitter ale, he tried to sort out his disparate thoughts. Young Reinhard seemed to be in charge; his father, Jay guessed, had died and left his son the store. He wondered if the mother shared her boy’s political views. If she did not, perhaps he could use that as a lever to induce her to put Jay in contact with Arietta. But how?

He went down the street to a public telephone booth and called the Gehrig residence. She answered the phone.

“Mrs. Gehrig, this is Police Detective Gerhardt Mueller. I’m calling about your son and his participation in an organization that we have some concerns about, the Friends of the New Germany. I wonder if I could come to the house to speak to you . . .”

She cut him off. “I have nothing to do with those Nazi swine!” and slammed down the receiver.

Conclusion: Mother and son did not see eye to eye on politics. Anything else? Reinhard lived at home and probably supported her. The Maglioccos were temporarily hiding at 334, and Mr. M. was parking his car elsewhere. But if Jay waited outside the Gehrig house and Arietta and her father failed to appear, what then? But having no other choice, he parked a few doors away and sat peering over a paper. Around noon, a police car materialized, slowly moving in his direction. Jay guessed that a neighbor had probably complained about a fellow loitering in his car out front. Pulling away from the curb, he drove around town and took in some of the sights: the city hall, a brewery, a small art museum. That evening, he caught a showing of Mary Astor in
Red Hot Tires
.

The next morning, he awoke around five, found a small r
estaurant, ordered some waffles with maple syrup, drove to Sixteenth Street, and parked, but this time in front of a different house. Around nine, he saw the Waterhouse coming down the street. The driver parked in front of number 334. Jay could not see anyone else in the car. Perhaps that was best. He would be able to confront Mr. M. and explain his concerns. One of his legs began to shake uncontrollably. A man with cotton knickers and matching lid exited the auto and briskly strode to the front door. At first, Jay thought his eyes had deceived him. Not until he had a close look at the man in plus fours was he convinced that this fellow was not Piero Magliocco. Perhaps this guy garaged the car and was now bringing it to Mr. M. for his use. Jay approached him. With his heart thumping wildly, he said, “Pardon me, sir, I’m looking for a friend who used to drive this same car.”

The fellow jerked back his head and squinted as if he could see objects or people only at a distance. “Oh, you mean Mr. Magliocco?”

“Yes.”

“A fine old gentleman.”

Jay wondered about the stilted reply and the adjective. The man looked at least ten years older than Piero, but Jay just nodded in agreement and said, “Will he and his daughter be here this morning?”

The fellow replied with what Jay could now identify as a slight English accent. “I should hardly think so.”

“Why’s that?”

“He sold the motor to me, I gathered, to pay for train tickets, and to cover his expenses in California. Agna Gehrig and I are old friends.”

Jay’s head whirled, and the earth beneath his feet shook. Certain that he had misheard, he asked, “Would you kindly repeat what you said?”

“Mr. Gehrig introduced me. Reinhard knew that I was in the market for a Waterhouse. It was all rather sudden.”

“Cal . . . uh . . . fornia?” Jay stuttered.

“Piero, he had located a job there and needed to leave at once.”

“But he loved that car,” Jay mumbled to no one in particular.

“Understandably. A wonderful motor car.”

“He sold it,” Jay repeated reflexively.

“Good price, too,” the gent said. “Must go, Agna expects me.”

“You wouldn’t happen to know when Piero intended to leave?”

“As a matter of fact, I think today.”

Jay thanked him, darted for his car, and raced to the train station. Leaping from the Ford, he dashed for the platforms. A ticket taker at one of the gates, seeing his anxiety, volunteered to help.

“I’m looking for the train to California.”

“Which one? We have two, a morning train that has already left for Los Angeles via Chicago and another leaving this afternoon for San Francisco with a stop in Minneapolis.”