There Were Only Three of Them
The moment I drew my gun, the color drained from Moretti's face.
He cried out in pure terror.
"I-I'll sign it!"
Without a second's hesitation, Moretti scrawled his name and shoved the paper at me.
I checked the signature, then tucked the document inside my coat.
"This memorandum is your certificate of partnership with us. Now I need to hear your plan so I can decide how best to help you."
Moretti rolled his eyes, then spilled the whole scheme.
First he meant to dump the whiskey in the warehouse, using the proceeds to buy men and guns.
"You know how it is. Jersey City isn't Manhattan — the gangs here don't run that big."
So before Prohibition really took hold, he planned to wipe out his rivals, seize the smuggling routes, and build his power from there.
"These rivals of yours — Irish outfits?"
"Touch the Irish right now and there's nothing in it for us. We'd just get torn apart. So I was going to unite the Italians first and absorb the smaller crews."
I liked Moretti's answer.
The eastern New Jersey shoreline was thick with Irish dockworkers. Some of them had naturally formed independent gangs, shaking down unions and laborers, dipping into smuggling. In sheer numbers, the Italians couldn't even compete.
Which was exactly why I intended to grow both sides — Irish and Italian. Once both groups reached a certain size, absorbing them would be far more profitable.
Next I asked about the bootleg distribution routes.
Moretti answered without a hitch.
"New Jersey's got the major rail lines that feed into the American interior. Use the Erie Railroad and you can haul booze all the way to Ohio, Indiana, Illinois."
Beyond that: Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, and north to the Canadian border. Jersey City was a vital rail terminus and manufacturing hub — perfect for moving illegal liquor.
"So what do you need?"
"Money and guns."
"I'll give you five thousand dollars and ten pistols."
I said it casually, and Moretti actually stammered in shock.
"Y-you're just going to hand that over?"
"Nothing in this world is free. This is an investment in a partner. If that investment fails to pay off, you'll lose everything."
"…"
"Four days from now. Exactly at midnight. I'll come with the money and the weapons."
I set the time and sealed the promise.
Before we left the warehouse, I tossed one last line at Moretti and his associates.
"That cold-blooded streak — abandoning even your own partners. Moretti, that's why we chose you. Don't forget it."
Moretti's face twisted. The two men who had just been held hostage glared at me like they'd bitten into something rotten.
I laughed behind my scarf and turned my back on them.
Once we were a good distance from the warehouse, I gave Brian his orders.
"Keep a close watch. Anything fishy, you report it right away."
I left Brian and four of the men behind.
I had forced a physical abandonment memorandum on Moretti, humiliated him, and even revealed the Union's name.
Two options lay open to him now.
Become a true partner with the Union — or flip on us and try a double-cross.
If it was the first, we simply kept watching. If it was the second, the results would show soon enough.
If Moretti decided to eliminate us, he would have no choice but to pull in other factions. Truthfully, that was the picture I wanted most.
Midnight was drawing close.
On the road back to the docks, I asked the men,
"Think Tanner's asleep right now?"
"No chance. He's playing cards."
"That's what I figured."
A different axis from Moretti — time to grow the Irish gangs as well. It had been too long since I'd seen Tanner.
Willy Moretti felt like death warmed over.
First some bastards appear out of nowhere and stick guns in their faces, then they calmly announce they're the Union gang from Manhattan's LES.
Even in Jersey City the Union name had been circulating openly. Precisely since the Five Points Gang of the LES — after that half-boss Izzy Joe got himself assassinated.
The long-time rulers of the LES had collapsed. The rising outfit that filled the vacuum was the Union.
Maybe this is actually an opportunity.
The physical abandonment memo was a problem, but the Union was far stronger than the fallen Hudson Dusters and that Gugu Nox character. And they were offering money and guns on top of it.
Coldly considered, there was no reason to refuse the Union's proposal. Except—
That cold-blooded streak — abandoning even your own partners. Moretti, that's why we chose you. Don't forget it.
Damn it. Why the hell did he have to say that?
The way his partners looked at him had already changed.
DeMeo ground his teeth and spat,
"Moretti, those bastards probably killed Gugu Nox. And you want to shake hands with them!?"
DeMeo's voice rose. He pushed further.
"How about we just throw them to the Manhattan Italian gangs instead?"
"Good thinking, DeMeo. Both the Sicilians and the Neapolitans have been going crazy trying to find the Union."
DiNorscio piled on right behind him.
Moretti sighed at the two men seized by rage.
"Sicilian or Neapolitan — what exactly are you going to tell them? Where's the Union headquarters? Hell, how do you even prove those guys were Union?"
DeMeo and DiNorscio had no ready answer. Moretti soothed them.
"Whatever comes later, right now there's no downside. They're handing us money and guns, aren't they? Take that first — we can decide after."
"And Gugu Nox?"
"Who cares? He couldn't survive this game anyway. He was going to drag us down with him."
Moretti quoted the scarf-wearing man's words almost verbatim.
He had partnered with them out of necessity; he had never once thought of those pieces of trash as real comrades.
Opportunity was opportunity. Played right, swallowing all of New Jersey wasn't even a dream. With the Union — the new masters of the LES — it was possible.
His partners thought otherwise.
Neither of them had any intention of joining hands with Irish bastards.
Outside the warehouse, out of Moretti's sight, DeMeo and DiNorscio exchanged quiet words.
"We can't trust Moretti. He's the one who dragged Gugu Nox into the business, and he doesn't even blink at what happens to a partner."
Moretti had always been the one making the plans. He would drone on endlessly about Prohibition and treat them like underlings.
And the parting shot from the man in the scarf still rankled.
A cold dread settled over them — the certainty that Moretti would discard them the moment it suited him.
Old grievances boiled over. DeMeo proposed a secret plan.
"We need to cut Moretti out. You never liked the idea of dealing with Irish bastards like Gugu Nox either, right?"
"Well… yeah. So?"
"We go straight to the Manhattan Sicilian gang ourselves. Salvatore D'Aquila's already got his eye on New Jersey."
"I'd rather deal with them, sure. But like Moretti said — we don't even know where the Union is based. We don't even know for certain those guys were Union."
"I've got a way around that."
Gugu Nox had gone to the underground gun shop of the Gunsmith in Hell's Kitchen. He had gone there to collect pistols from Finbar Maddox and then met with sudden misfortune — that much was fact.
"So we start with the Hell's Kitchen underground gun shop. Not that we can do it ourselves."
What DeMeo had in mind was using the remaining Hudson Dusters.
Their influence in Hell's Kitchen had shrunk, but the remnants were still there. And if those men learned that founding member Gugu Nox had been murdered…
"Mention Finbar Maddox and they'll move on their own."
"Exactly."
"So the Hudson Dusters hit the Union in Hell's Kitchen, and the Sicilians hit them here?"
"It's a pincer. We've only got four days — we move fast."
Outside the warehouse, Brian and the men watched the two of them whispering together.
A little ways from ILA headquarters sat Local #824.
Among the dockworkers it was known as "The Pistol Local" — a union that was also a gang, moving labor from the shadows.
And Tanner Smith had made himself at home there.
"Well, look who it is. What's the Boss doing in a dump like this?"
"It's well past midnight and you're playing cards. Aren't you a little too free?"
"This is work. Building rapport with the union officers."
I snorted and laid out everything that had happened in Jersey City. Tanner rubbed his chin with a doubtful look.
"Can we trust those guys? Feels like they'll use us for all we're worth, then turn around and team up with the Italians to put a knife in our back."
"We'll see. They use us, we use them right back."
I had sown the seeds. Whatever grew, some of it would be poison weeds.
"We pull the weeds and cultivate only the plants that thrive."
And when the poison weeds formed a thicket, they only became easier to spot. Cut them out and absorb the territory — the work got simpler.
"Still, like you said, the Italians might band together among themselves. So we need a second option ready."
"Second option?"
"The Irish gangs."
"One side Italian, the other side Irish? You really are a cunning bastard."
Tanner's face lit with interest as he continued.
"Manhattan and New Jersey aren't the same. Difference of scale, you could say. Over there they don't really operate as organizations — more like small family-style communities."
"Not gangs. Just crews."
"That's the perfect word. But narrow it down to inside Jersey City and the picture changes."
The waterfront was held by scattered Irish crews, but inside the city proper a very different kind of organization existed.
"You know Frank Hague?"
"Mayor of Jersey City, right?"
"That's him. Irish immigrant and Democratic politician."
His political base was Irish Catholic, and he made a career out of standing against the hypocritical Protestant Republicans who despised them. His slogan was simple: Us Against Them.
He split Jersey City's citizens and stoked the immigrant Irish vote.
"In New Jersey there's something called the 'Frank Hague Organization.' Oddly enough, it cares about only one thing — elections and votes."
Ballot stuffing, electioneering by force. Yet because it operated inside the legal political system, people called it an organization rather than a gang.
Through it, Mayor Hague gripped Hudson County — Jersey City, Hoboken, and everything around them.
"Tammany Hall in Manhattan used gangs for elections. Hague's outfit doesn't touch anything illegal outside of election day. That's the biggest difference."
"Honestly, that doesn't make sense. Once you have power, you end up using it somehow."
Tanner shrugged.
"I think the same."
"Whatever the case — if we want a bootlegging business in New Jersey, we have to dig into Hague's organization."
"Right."
Irish crews along the eastern waterfront, Hague's political machine inside the city. To crack them, it was better to start from the edges.
"Tanner. Among the Irish crews working the Jersey City docks, point me to one Brian and the boys can infiltrate."
"Brian? With his personality, does 'vice president of a flea market' even make sense? I'd have quit ages ago."
"That's why I send him on field work."
"And that field work is New Jersey? Mamma mia. You've been hanging around those Italian bastards too long — their habits are rubbing off."
Tanner chuckled, then suddenly remembered something and brought up Coney Island.
"Oh, right. Kieran — you know that bouncer who used to work at the Harvard Inn? Scarface."
The man who had gotten fresh with a woman and had his face carved open by her brother. From that day on they called him Scarface.
"Al Capone?"
"Oh, you even know the name. Anyway, he got into it with the White Hand Gang right in front of my place and damn near crippled them."
"Which side ended up half-crippled?"
"The White Hands. So now Dini Meehan is furious and hunting Scarface. Frankie Yale's gotten involved too."
I had read about this in the books on Capone — the knife scar, and the same year being chased by a rival gang.
"So what's the situation now?"
"Dini Meehan asked me to tip him off if I spot Scarface anywhere in Manhattan."
"He must be truly pissed."
I talked with Tanner longer than I had in ages, and only returned to the LES after morning broke.
Brian brought news from Jersey City the following day.
Second-floor office of the twin buildings.
"Moretti ran!?"
"More accurately, he got driven out, Boss."
"There were only three of them — and the other two staged a coup?"
It was almost absurd. On the other hand, it confirmed that Moretti's desire for partnership had been genuine.
So he really did want to be a partner.
For all the good it did him.
A fool driven out by his own men.
Maybe I had overdone the sowing of discord. I hadn't even aimed for it — just tossed the words out.
There was more important news.
"The one named DeMeo met a very interesting character in Hell's Kitchen."
"Who?"
"Gugu Nox's old crew. From the looks of it, they're eyeing the Gunsmith's underground workshop."
The Marginals and the Hudson Dusters had both operated in the same Hell's Kitchen territory. Brian and the men knew them well.
I had crossed paths with the Hudson Dusters more than a few times myself.
"We'll wipe them all out."
Including Gugu Nox.
I summoned the men, then went downstairs to the lingerie shop on the first floor. Hazel was straightening clothes after the last customers had left. I called her over.
"Got a minute?"
"Suddenly making my heart race. What's going on?"
Hazel leaned in with a crescent-eyed smile. I took half a step back.
"You still have those pistols that are rare in America? The ones whose ammo is hard to find?"
"Wow. I do, I do."
Hazel cheerfully took the lead.
"This way, Boss."
Down in the shooting range, she pulled a pistol and ammunition from the back of a deep drawer.
The same blowback Beretta M1915 model she had shown me before. Not the 9mm Parabellum common in America, but Italy's own military round — 9mm Glisenti.
Perfect for this.
"Ideal for framing someone, right?"
Hazel said it. Somehow she had read my mind completely.
"It's not like that."
"Look me in the eye when you say it, Boss. Don't look away."
"…It's not."