The Troublesome Artichokes
On the way back to Manhattan Harbor.
Aboard the boat cutting through the dark river on the wind, I found myself thinking of the bootleg liquor that would soon be hauled across these waters in the Prohibition years.
When that time came, a boat this size would never be enough.
"Could you handle something a lot bigger than this?"
"Of course. I may not look it, but I'm a first mate. If it weren't for that Indian half-breed label stuck on me, I'd be captaining a ship ten times this size."
Small fishing boats and coastal vessels had loose regulations, so plenty of men became captains on practical experience alone. Ocean-going freighters were another story. A captain's license was mandatory—navigation, maritime safety, maritime law, cargo management, meteorology, the whole battery of exams. Most men started as crew and worked their way up; the requirements scaled with the size of the ship, and making captain was never easy.
"What does the half-breed label have to do with being a captain?"
"You'll understand once you start climbing. When you're just crew, if you work like a dog everyone respects you."
The trouble, he said, started the higher he rose.
"I finally got the captain's post I'd dreamed of, and I couldn't get the men to follow me. There's more politics on a ship than you'd think."
River Grey pulled down his collar. In the dark it was hard to see clearly, but he said it was a mutiny scar—a knife wound from when the crew rose against him.
"Of course, maybe it was my leadership. A man who never should have been captain in the first place, so maybe all that half-breed talk was just an excuse."
"There's no need to tear yourself down like that."
River gave a wistful smile and nodded.
"You're right. And honestly, I'm a lot more at ease now. Nothing's more nerve-wracking than sharing a deck with men who might turn on you any second."
"So how did you end up knowing Tanner Smith?"
"I heard there was a famous gang boss among the men leading the pier union strike over in Pier 5, so I went looking for him. Showed him this scar and told him I wanted to kill every last one of them…"
He had asked Tanner to get him guns and ammunition. Tanner refused.
"He said all I'd ruin was myself, and told me to find something else to do."
"And just like that he eased you into smuggling."
"Took me a long time to realize Tanner was a slippery old fox. Still, he's got loyalty, so we've kept the relationship going."
Tanner, he said, actually brought him more legitimate work than contraband jobs.
The conversation circled back to my first question.
"So what would you do with a bigger ship?"
"What else? Smuggle. I just want to scale it up a bit."
"You've got a hell of an appetite. Get me a ship and enough crew, and we're fine."
"You… don't think the problem might be the people who were found for you?"
River hesitated.
When a company ran freighters, it hired captains and crews to its own taste. That was how you ended up with men who could never mix forced into the same space. The crew that had mutinied that day had been exactly that kind of mix.
"Start building one from here on out. There are definitely men out there you can trust and work with."
"So have you made a lot of people you can trust?"
"No. That's why I'm still working at it this very moment."
River studied me for a long beat, then the corner of his mouth lifted. He tipped his head back and looked up at the stars.
"If I'm going to work with you, I'd better hustle and find some crew."
"We've got two years."
"Pretty specific."
Manhattan Harbor, Pier 35.
We packed the weapons into crates and offloaded them from the boat.
"What about the guns and bombs the White Hand boss supplied?"
"Tanner will return them."
"So until then I get to cuddle the bombs."
"Be careful when you light up."
River had just been about to light a cigarette. He flung the lit match straight into the river.
"See you around, then."
Even at night the docks swarmed with laborers. I hauled the crates like a porter and slipped out of the harbor.
I reached home at eleven that night.
When I opened the door, Mother, who had been slumped over the kitchen table, bolted upright. Her eyes swept over me from head to toe, then she smiled.
"Son, have you been eating properly?"
"Of course. But from now on just sleep in your room. This isn't a one- or two-day thing."
"If I'm here, I get to see my son's face the second he walks through the door."
Confirming I had come back in one piece was enough. She rose from the table, gave me a quick hug, and started for her room.
"Something been stressing you out?"
"No? Why?"
A sheet of paper covered in scribbles lay on the table. Mother covered her mouth and laughed softly.
"Roa was afraid she'd forget your face, so she drew this. Two days without seeing you—that's a first for her."
"Looks like she already forgot."
There was no other way she could have drawn me like that.
"Don't you dare. You'll hurt Roa's feelings. You're tired—go to bed."
I set the crate aside, changed clothes, and stretched out on the bed. That was when—
"Hyung."
"Jesus—you nearly gave me a heart attack. You're still awake?"
"Can't sleep."
"Who beat you up this time?"
"Yeah. So I need something new."
"…Just go to sleep for now."
Once Liam learned something, he latched onto it with near-obsessive focus. Whether those obsessions would actually help his future was another question worth thinking about. Having something to pour yourself into was fine. The problem was that this particular obsession was fighting technique. Unless I planned to drag him into the gangster life, I needed to give him something more useful to fixate on.
The next morning, Roa's little fern-like hands shook me awake.
"Big brother, when did you get home?"
"Late last night. Which means I should sleep more, right? I'm tired, right?"
"People get all the sleep they want when they're dead. Living people have to see faces. Didn't you miss Roa at all?"
Roa forcibly pried my eyelids open.
"I've seen Roa. Good. Now sleep."
"…"
I rolled over to try again, only for Liam to start pestering me this time.
"Hyung. I need something new."
This damn household. We needed to move into a three-room place already.
"Big brother's up! He's up!"
"Since you're up, eat breakfast and then go back to sleep."
I scratched my messy hair and headed for the table. The second I sat down, Roa thrust a sheet of paper at me.
"Big brother, what do you think this is?"
"Wow, that's me."
Roa giggled and shrugged.
"I drew it before I forgot big brother's face. Roa worked so hard remembering brother's eyes and nose and mouth."
"Must have been really hard. Which is probably why it didn't quite come out—"
"Kieran."
Mother fixed me with a look. I shut my mouth and ruffled Roa's hair.
"This is basically a photograph. A real photograph."
"Big brother, should Roa make a frame and give it to you?"
"Sure. The frame would cost more than the—"
"Kieran!"
Mother's short prayer opened the meal. While chewing bread I spoke to Liam.
"You said you need a new technique?"
"Yeah. I need an ultimate finishing move."
"How are your studies going?"
"I show up to school every day. What more do you want?"
"Have you ever been hit with a baguette? Hyung sometimes uses these as weapons, you know."
Liam flinched and leaned his face away from me. Meanwhile Roa touched the baguette and nodded.
"Roa got hit with one too. It hurt a lot."
"What?!"
Everyone stopped eating and stared at Roa. Mother's eyelids trembled as she asked,
"Who hit Roa with this?"
"Some man walking by said we were too loud and hit Roa and Jake on the head with a baguette right in front of the house."
"And… then what?"
"Aunt Mary yelled at him real hard. Then he made chicken noises and left."
"Chicken?"
"Bawk-bawk-bawk-bawk."
That son of a bitch. If I ever caught him, I was going to cave his skull in with a baguette. Who hits a kid like Roa?
Liam shuddered and looked at me with grim determination.
"Hyung, teach me a finishing move and I'll make him pay."
"How are you going to find some random guy who walked by? While we're on the subject—you've got a test soon, right?"
"I took one a few days ago."
"Yeah? You probably bombed that one anyway. Score a B or higher on the next one and I'll teach you a three-hit combo."
"Three-hit combo?"
"A skill that finishes the fight in three straight hits the second it starts."
"Whoa!" Liam suddenly looked triumphant. "I took the test a few days ago and got an A."
"P.E. doesn't count."
"What are you talking about? It was English, math, history, science. Comprehensive exam."
"Little brother, check if your V is upside down. Roa does that sometimes too. It's nothing to be embarrassed about. Your face is all red, how cute."
"It's red because I'm annoyed."
Roa squeezed Liam's hand, and Mother herself pulled out the report card to settle the truth.
"Didn't you all know our Liam is smart? I'm not even surprised."
Roa and I blinked down at the card. Roa shouted "Amazing!" while I pictured the three-hit combo I would teach him—the Taebaek form of Taekwondo. Keep feeding him forms all the way to Taegeuk, and he'd end up at Harvard.
After the noisy breakfast we scattered. Mother and Roa walked hand-in-hand to Aunt Mary's house; Liam headed off to the school he claimed to hate. I left the house and caught a westbound streetcar on Canal Street.
Mid-Manhattan, the western docks of Hell's Kitchen.
Warehouse 7 at Pier 88.
I found the big three-story warehouse by the waterfront. The doors were shut tight, but Gavin, standing watch at a second-floor window, waved. A moment later only enough of the warehouse door opened for me to slip through, and Gavin poked his head out.
"Come on in, Noxsniper!"
"Aren't you being a little lazy with the nicknames?"
"We've got Deadeye, One-Shot, Ghost Shooter—which one do you like?"
"Dead… eye?"
"Call."
Gavin nodded and stepped aside to let me in. Inside, about twenty men were sorting cargo. The second Gavin shouted, every eye locked onto me.
"Deadeye Nox is here!"
"Ohh, Irish Deadeye Nox!"
"Irish Deadeye Nox!"
"Woo! Woo!"
They set down their loads and raised their hands, howling like animals. Even Patrick, usually so quiet, joined in.
"Praise Dead Irish Deadeye Nox, who one-shot one-killed twelve men!"
"Woo! Woo!"
Trainees Number One and Number Two were there too, staring at their instructor with pure respect and admiration. I had a feeling I could push the training even harder from now on. That was one thing. Without thinking, I tugged my scarf higher. Not out of embarrassment or pressure—purely to preserve Nox's mystique, image management, limited exposure…
A hand clamped onto mine.
Tanner Smith had appeared out of nowhere and taken hold of my wrist.
"Didn't like Noxsniper? I came up with that one."
"It just sounded half-assed."
"And Deadeye doesn't? Anyway, this way."
Tanner led me to a small office in the corner of the warehouse. Barely big enough for five people, it still had chairs and a desk. He handed me a sheet of paper—an inventory of the seized contraband with quantities and rough values.
"Thirty-five to a maximum of forty-five thousand dollars."
The ten-thousand-dollar spread came down to how long it took to move the goods. The faster you dumped them, the lower the profit and the higher the risk.
"The stuff that actually makes money—cigarettes, cigars, premium whiskey, wine, cognac, plus the opium and cocaine—we can move all of that within a few days."
"Take our time with the rest. No rush."
"If someone traces it back to us, that's a problem."
"I doubt it. The Navy Street Gang won't have the bandwidth."
"True. Lose men and lose the goods, your eyes turn red. Hard to see straight."
Tanner shrugged, then looked at me and finally let out an impressed whistle.
"Anyway, yesterday's work was insane. Honestly never imagined you'd snipe from across the river. Those instructors at the Korean Boy Soldier School—what the hell kind of people are they?"
When he asked if I could teach him how to snipe, I immediately changed the subject.
"Did Dini Meehan show up at the site yesterday?"
"Hm? Didn't hear anything about him being among the White Hand boys doing the haul."
"Not at the warehouse—another position. There were five more men."
"Five men?!"
Tanner's eyes went wide; then his face twisted and his fist clenched.
"Dini Meehan, that bastard broke the deal. He was planning to stab us in the back the second things went south."
"They were probably nervous about what I'd do with the bombs too. Still, a broken promise is a broken promise."
"How are we supposed to do business like this?"
"We'll see how they play it going forward. Cutting them off completely would hurt us more."
The Coney Island saloon opening. And once Prohibition hit, if we wanted to use the Brooklyn docks we needed to stay on good terms with the White Hand Gang. Separate from that, Tanner made no effort to hide his fury at the broken word.
"Never doing a deal like this again. The near-fight right in front of the warehouse, and if you hadn't fired that warning shot the whole plan would've gone to hell. Goddamn sons of bitches."
"Why that particular deal all of a sudden, though?"
"Because of the artichokes, what else."
After Tanner explained, I couldn't help but praise Patrick.
"Good instincts. Never imagined there'd be artichokes in that warehouse."
"Years back Patrick and I hit a produce wagon. It was packed with artichokes."
Artichokes grew in mild, warm climates. Cultivation had recently started in Monterey, California, but the country still relied heavily on imports. That made them a luxury ingredient—and expensive.
"And the storage—you know there was ice in the artichoke warehouse?"
Artichokes were finicky. Importers used ice holds or refrigerated ships because three days at room temperature and the leaves dried out, the stems started to wilt.
"Renting a cold storage out of nowhere would've looked suspicious, so we just moved them somewhere already packed with ice."
"How much is there?"
"Four hundred kilos. Twelve crates. Asked an Italian restaurant owner—he said they use about two hundred kilos for a festival. Sell it and you're looking at maybe a hundred dollars."
Less than I'd expected. Two months' wages for an ordinary laborer. Big money in absolute terms, sure, but hard to believe Italian gangs were killing each other over that little.
"There's an element of showing off too. I heard the Italian gangs use artichokes to throw their weight around in the immigrant community."
"So how do you plan to move them?"
"My head's already hurting. Everything else is fine, but artichokes—whether you sell to a middleman or dump them straight at market—if someone digs, the trail leads back to us."
Smuggling them to another city risked them wilting in transit. All around, a pure nuisance…
I had a solution almost immediately.
"Do we really need to sweat a hundred dollars?"
"You got a bright idea?"
"You know St. Patrick's Old Cathedral?"
"Sure. Church that's been there over a hundred years."
"Location is everything."
The cathedral sat right in the heart of Little Italy, packed with Italian immigrants. Naturally most of the congregation was Italian.
"Dump the artichokes there."
"…Come again?"
"Who would donate artichokes—the ingredient they treasure—to a church full of Italians? The Navy Street boys who just lost their goods will immediately suspect the Sicilians."
Fan the flames already roaring inside the Navy Street Gang. Tanner grasped my meaning at once.
"Pour gasoline on the fire, huh?"
"The soul food of the Italians. Artichokes make perfect kindling, don't they?"
"Wow… You're a devil. An actual devil."
That night at midnight, the troublesome artichokes rode a wagon into Little Italy.
And the next morning—
"Hallelujah!"
"Mamma mia!"
A festival erupted in front of St. Patrick's Old Cathedral.
That was only the beginning.
That same night, the Neapolitan Navy Street Gang hit gambling dens, brothels, and saloons run by the Sicilians.
"Da oggi, tutti quei figli di Sicilia diventano cadaveri!" (From today, every last Sicilian son of a bitch becomes a corpse!)
"Vendetta di sangue!" (Blood vengeance!)
Neapolitan Camorra versus Sicilian Mafia.
Using Manhattan as their battlefield, the two factions launched into a bloody war.