Part 33 (1/2)

Willie, still staring straight ahead, thinks. Then nods. Egan gets back in the car.

Willie speeds away.

Guess you're stuck with me, Egan says.

You must have other family, Egan. How about your parents?

Ma died giving birth to me.

Uh-huh. Dad?

Whoever he was, he ran off years ago.

Any more siblings?

Five brothers.

Any of them local?

Let's see. There's Charlie. He's a b.u.m, but he'll take me in. Bang a right at the corner.

Charlie the b.u.m meets them at the curb. Clearly he's had a phone call from the previous brother. He holds out his hand like a traffic cop. He's not accepting delivery either. He turns the hand over, palm to the sky. He's a little short of cash and he's hoping Willie Sutton, the famous bank robber, can float him a loan. Or else he'll be forced to call the cops. Now. Willie gives him five hundred bucks, speeds away.

Egan cradles his head. Willie considers slowing the car, kicking Egan out. But he can't help feeling for a guy shunned by his brothers. Name another brother, Willie says.

Egan thinks. Sean, he says. Yeah. Sean. He's probably forgiven me for that thing that time.

Sean lives on the other side of town. Willie cuts through Central Park, past a large Hooverville. More than a tent city, it's a tent metropolis, with streets, neighborhoods, dogs, cats. And it's not just hoboes living in this Hooverville. There are whole families. Good families. Willie brakes. He and Egan both stare. f.u.c.kin Hoover, Willie says.

Yeah, Egan says.

Pig-face. p.a.w.n of Rockefeller. Lackey to all those Wall Street boys. Did you know old Herbert was a millionaire before he was thirty?

Really? Is that a fact? Herbert Who?

They come at last to Sean's house, a handsome brownstone. Sparkling clean front stoop, trim red window boxes with orange geraniums surviving the winter. Sean, apparently, is the most successful of the Egans. This time Willie and Egan are met at the curb by Sean's wife. She says she'd sooner take in a wild dog, oozing with rabies, before she'd take in this sorry excuse for a brother-in-law.

She screams at Willie: He was fine where he was. We had a s.h.i.+ndig the night he got convicted. Why did you help him break out?

He helped me.

And why is he bald?

It's a long story.

Well you're stuck with him. May G.o.d have mercy on you.

Sutton stands outside the former location of Chateau Madrid, now an Indian restaurant. What's that smell? he says.

Curry, Photographer says, rummaging in his cloth purse. And vomit.

Amazing, Sutton says, how certain parts of New York smell just like prison.

And what's the significance of this little corner of heaven, Willie?

Let's go in that bar and I'll tell you.

Reporter and Photographer look. A bar they hadn't noticed.

Jimmy's? Oh, Mr. Sutton, that place looks-awful.

It's seen better days. But I told you, Willie needs a hair of the dog and this joint meets my number one requirement for a bar.

What's that?

It's open.

Willie pulls into the alley behind Chateau Madrid. He and Egan slip through a side door, through the kitchen, into a dark barroom. A hanging lamp glows above the bar, where a bartender in a white s.h.i.+rt, with green sleeve garters, leans over a newspaper.

Willie clears his throat. The bartender looks up.

I'd like to see Dutch Schultz, Willie says.

He's out.

Bo Weinberg then?

Bo know you?

No.

Then he's out too.

I'm Willie Sutton.

Yeah right.

Willie steps into the light, pulling Egan by the elbow. The bartender looks at them, then at the front page. Then again at them. His eyes grow wide-a blond Willie Sutton and a bald Johnny Egan. Well if that don't beat all, he says.

Bartender slips through a hidden door in the bar back and returns moments later with Bo. Willie has never met Bo, but he's seen his mug shot in the papers many times and he knows the man's reputation. The most feared killer in New York. Bo took out Legs Diamond just last year.

What mug shots and reputation don't convey, can't convey, is Bo's size. Every bit of Bo is big. His head, his hands, his lips-even his chin is an overgrown bulb of flesh. Willie can't imagine how he shaves that thing. Bo motions for Willie to come back to the office. Willie feels his feet moving involuntarily. He tells Egan to stay.

The office is the size of a corner booth at the Silver Slipper. A large English desk barely leaves room for a hat rack and filing cabinet. Bo now sits behind the desk. You take a big chance, he says. Coming here. Heart of midtown. Some b.a.l.l.s.

Dutch once said I should look him up if I'm ever in trouble. I'm in trouble.

So I hear. What do you need? Money?

No.