A New Name, a New Beginning, and the First Job

“You know a guy named Dopey Benny?”

That was the first question Tanner threw at me up on the rooftop.

Naturally, it was a name I’d never heard before.

“Who’s that?”

Tanner watched the change in my expression the way a man studies a poker face.

“You really don’t know? Dopey Benny—the one who walks around with his eyes half-shut like he’s hopped up on something?”

“Never heard of him. Is he someone I need to know?”

“Well, not exactly. I just had a hunch that Dopey Benny might be your role model.”

My only role model is myself. Who out there is great enough to copy?

This had sprung from a mild misunderstanding. No—once I heard Tanner out, I could see exactly why he’d thought it.

“Dopey Benny’s a shtarker who worked the labor side, same as me. Three years back, when the gangs shot it out over the labor market, he was right at the center of it.”

The bosses hired gangs to break the workers’ strike pickets. Dopey Benny had stood on the opposite side—a shtarker who fought tooth and nail for the laborers.

In the Yiddish of the Jewish streets, shtarker means gangster, which told me Dopey Benny was Jewish himself.

“That’s old news, of course. What matters is Dopey Benny today. Early this year he took over a garment factory and went into business.”

The wages he paid his workers ran higher than the average, and he split the profits with the men under him—two dollars to a worker, seven ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to a lieutenant, that kind of arrangement.

“Watching what you’re trying to build now, Dopey Benny was the first name that popped into my head.”

More than anything, Dopey Benny was a cruel, cold-blooded son of a bitch. You could see it in the way he handled his enemies: ears sliced off, kneecaps and arms shattered, bodies shoved down stairwells. Women were fair game too.

“I’m not that far gone.”

“Of course you’re different.”

Dopey Benny sent his boys to do the dirty work. I, on the other hand, had personally put down the con-artist boss, the Hudson Dusters, and Johnny Spanish.

“What really floored me was how a string of completely unrelated scrapes all added up. You went past just being good in a fight and good at killing.”

At first he’d only assigned me a few men out of curiosity, planning to sit back and watch what happened.

“The longer it went, the more everything ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠started rolling exactly the way you wanted it. Pretty damn remarkable, don’t you think?”

“I got lucky.”

“Share a little of that luck with me, will you?”

Tanner chuckled, then his face went serious.

“Business and a gang. Looks like you want both. You know how hard that is, right?”

“I figure.”

“You know why I walked away from the gangs?”

“Did you actually walk away?”

“Damn right I did. Anyway, the second I got out of the joint, my mother and little sister were crying, begging me.”

No more dangerous work, they said.

“Family’s the most precious thing in this world, isn’t it? You found that out yourself this time around. Who’s to say when the next Johnny Spanish will come knocking on your door?”

It wasn’t much, but Tanner insisted I needed a moniker—another self I could hide behind.

“For the record, almost nobody outside my family knows my real name. You need a name like that too.”

“I’ve already got one in mind.”

Nox.

Latin for “night.” My old codename from the mercenary days.

“Good name for a double life. Almost arrogant, too—like you’re declaring you’ll become the night itself.”

“That’s just your imagination talking.”

Tanner gave a pleased little laugh and nodded.

“I’ll forget the old name. Starting today everyone calls you Nox, not Rookie. And with that in mind, time you started real work, don’t you think?”

Work for the gang, not the business.

The scrap of paper Tanner handed me laid out a concrete job, the kind of thing I’d already been doing.

“The fact that the job is an assassination is surprising enough. ‘No reward’ is downright shocking.”

“So if there was a reward it wouldn’t be a problem?”

“Both are problems. Let’s get this straight right now. I said I wanted to build a gang. I never said I wanted to climb under somebody else’s.”

Manhattan alone had over a thousand gangs. Plenty of them were satellites, and the peculiar thing was how they stayed linked to the big outfits purely by mutual interest. If things soured they simply shook hands with a rival crew or jumped ship altogether.

“I know. Look at the location. This isn’t an order—it’s work for our vision.”

I shifted my eyes back to the slip.

“You’ve got one thing wrong. The real freight doesn’t run through Lower Manhattan’s South Harbor. It runs through Red Hook.”

A critical hub for cargo coming in across the Atlantic. European, Caribbean, Canadian contraband all funneled through Red Hook before it spread into New York and the rest of the eastern seaboard.

“Manhattan docks mostly handle domestic freight, and the heat there is a lot heavier.”

Red Hook, by contrast, was loosely watched—perfect conditions for smuggling.

“Prohibition or no Prohibition, that place is already a gang war zone. Whoever holds it decides how much money gets made.”

Tanner had cut straight to the bone. I already knew how important Red Hook was. The only reason I’d shoved it down the priority list was the simple fact that I had no muscle yet. How was I supposed to take the place?

Tanner, it seemed, had already forged a connection sooner than I’d expected. The job was tied to it. The man groaning under the loan sharks’ brutal collection methods was a Red Hook pier security guard.

“Until a few months ago he worked the same docks I did. Transfer to Red Hook, and he fell into gambling.”

The debt itself wasn’t the real problem. The sharks were using it to force the guard into clearing contraband. Instead of bribing the supervisors they threatened his family and sucked the honey for free.

“You can tell by the names—Italian boys. If word gets out we stuck our noses in, things get real complicated real fast.”

If we were going to fight over the docks we’d have to clash with them eventually, but not yet. I agreed with Tanner. We hadn’t even locked down the Lower East Side; widening the front now would only multiply enemies.

“Deadline?”

“Until that security guard decides to kill himself. That’s how bad they’re riding him. Anyway, I gotta go. Still haven’t gotten any rest.”

As we finished talking and started down from the roof I tossed out one last question.

“Why bring up Dopey Benny at all?”

The man had taken up a good chunk of the conversation. Knowing Tanner’s nature, it hadn’t been idle chatter.

“That garment business you’re starting—I don’t know much about it, but it won’t be easy. Dopey Benny might be useful.”

“Why would he help me?”

Tanner shrugged.

“He and Johnny Spanish were blood enemies. When he heard Johnny was dead he drank liquor he never touches and even started singing.”

Johnny the slugger who stood with the bosses. Dopey Benny who stood with the workers. The two of them had been itching to put each other in the ground.

“Just don’t trust Dopey Benny too far. He’s every bit as dangerous as Johnny was.”

We were coming down to the second floor when my mother appeared, climbing the stairs. Her startled eyes flicked from me to Tanner.

“Pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Graves. Tanner Smith.”

“Ah… n-nice to ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠meet you.”

A brief exchange of courtesies, then Tanner waved off any need to see him out and disappeared.

Once he was gone Mother asked, “How do you know Tanner Smith?”

“I was about to ask you the same thing. How do you know him?”

A gang boss? The name carried weight on the street, but not the kind a woman like Mother would normally hear.

“Your uncles mentioned him years ago. Said he had loyalty and sense—rare ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠among the gangs these days. I heard he was the one running the South Harbor strike.”

“That sounds right. Have you seen the uncles recently?”

“They’re still family. They must’ve heard about my situation and came by.”

Word that the con-artist boss had stiffed her and that she’d joined the picket line. The uncles had pooled fifty dollars and tried to give it to her—maybe even at the grandparents’ urging.

“I turned them down, of course. Said I didn’t need it.”

“Aigoo, so the feud’s on again.”

“Probably…”

They’d gone out of their way to scrape the money together, and she’d shut them down cold. From the brothers’ side it must have looked pure stubbornness—enough to make anyone snap.

Sure enough, Mother’s face turned sulky as she vented.

“They called me a hard-headed mule and said they never wanted to see me again. The nerve!”

From where I stood, Mother was the one with the problem. The grudge ran deep, or maybe she simply felt guilty for putting them out. If it was the latter…

“You’re not thinking you’ll wait until the money’s rolling in and then go make nice, are you?”

“How did you know? That’s exactly what I was thinking.”

Between the last life and this one, I really had lived longer.

“If you show up after you’re flush, they’ll just hate the sight of you more. Everything you do will look like showing off.”

“So what then?”

“They’re family, you said. You have to be willing to take help if you ever want to give it. Patch things up now, before it’s too late.”

“How do you always know just what to say? Anyway, that’s my business to handle.”

Instead of agreeing she only pouted. The question about how I knew Tanner Smith had already slipped her mind.

It was the first day of work at the little garment factory that now carried her own name.

Mother had been up before dawn fixing breakfast. Her back looked livelier than I’d ever seen it; she even had the leisure to talk while she cooked.

“Kieran, you know Imelda? The one who was moving to California.”

She’d put the move on hold and decided to work with them after all.

The real loss was the fifteen women who never stuck with the strike to the end. They’d found other jobs or simply left town. Most of them had disliked Mother taking investment money, or simply didn’t believe the business would survive. So instead of walking away clean they demanded compensation.

The investment capital was off-limits, but they held partial ownership of the sewing machines, so the demand wasn’t completely outrageous. Fifty dollars a head—seven hundred fifty dollars gone before we even started.

“We can still do this!” Mother declared.

Roa chimed in with full support. “Roa believes in Mama’s success with all her heart!”

“Aigoo, my little girl. How do you always say the sweetest things? And my two sons? Nothing to say?”

“Business takes stamina. Come train with me.”

Liam, drunk on the way his body was hardening day by day. Sooner or later someone would knock the sense back into him—stamina and fighting skill were two different animals.

“I’m off to Mama’s company!”

“Anyone listening would think you were going halfway across the country.”

“It’s the feeling that counts.”

She left full of hope. Reality was less kind. Brassieres needed specialized hooks and elastic bands we didn’t have yet, so for the moment they could only make the old-style drawers. The fabric for those had been bought ahead of time, so work could start immediately—but the stock wouldn’t last long.

To secure enough yardage Mother spent the first day hunting fabric suppliers.

Then the answer came.

— Looks like we won’t be able to supply you.

— What do you mean?

— Circumstances. You’ll hear the same thing wherever you go.

A new wall had gone up. She tried three more places; every one of them refused to sell her cloth. When she came home her face was thunderous.

“Petty bastards.”

“I thought it was strange how easily they settled.”

The garment bosses were settling scores. Who else would pull a cheap stunt like this?

We couldn’t run to the ILGWU and WTUL every time trouble appeared, and Mother was no longer a worker—she was an owner now. The moral high ground for a strike had gotten murky. The bosses had counted on exactly that: a worker who dared start her own shop, ready to be crushed.

Tanner’s words floated back to me.

— Dopey Benny might be useful.

The radical slugger who had stood with the workers, threatening, locking up, and beating garment bosses. Now that same Dopey Benny was running his own garment shop. What walls had the senior man hit, and how had he climbed over them?

I needed to pay him a visit.

The Red Hook hit was hanging over me, but the security guard—or whoever the real client was—wasn’t going to put a bullet in his own head in the next few days. He’d already lasted months.

The next morning I walked into Lafayette Street, thick with Jewish and Italian immigrants, and found the three-story building that housed the entire Dopey Shirtwaist Factory.

The office reeked of cigarette smoke. Three ugly, brooding men sat around a round table playing cards.

Cough—this was an office?

“Tanner Smith sent you?”

A voice drifted through the haze. I pushed the smoke aside with one hand. A man sat buried in a chair with his boots propped on the desk, staring me down. A whiskey bottle and glass waited on the blotter.

Benjamin “Dopey Benny” Payne.

Just as Tanner had said, the lids were puffy and half-closed, like a man riding a high.

“Tanner of the Marginals—that Tanner?”

“That’s right.”

Dopey Benny blew out a long stream of smoke and asked why I’d come. The sewing-machine affair was already known in the garment trade; he understood my story in one go.

“Those garment-boss sons of bitches are raising hell behind the scenes, huh. So you want advice on what to do next?”

“I do.”

Dopey Benny snorted. The card players joined in.

“Why should I?”

He leaned back, sneering, full of himself.

So that was why Tanner had left the hint. Blood enemies who’d shot at each other—Johnny Spanish and Dopey Benny.

If I claimed I’d killed Johnny he wouldn’t believe it, and I couldn’t say it anyway. Instead—

“I was the first one who found Johnny’s body.”

For a second Dopey Benny dragged deep on the cigarette, then exhaled. The glass of whiskey on the desk scraped toward me with a soft scrape.

“Drink first.”