“They’re hoping a two-reeler will get them to Broadway.”
The St. Regis doorman hailed a cab. Bell helped Marion into it. He leaned in and kissed her. She whispered, “I booked a suite upstairs,” and began to kiss him back.
The cabbie cleared his throat, loudly. “Say, mister, why don’t you just ride along with us?”
“Pipe down,” said the doorman. “You got something against love?”
• • •
BELOW THE FERRY TERMINAL at West 23rd Street, Marat Zolner lost sight of the Hudson River behind an unbroken wall of warehouses, bulkhead structures, and dock buildings. On the other side of that wall was a Dutch freighter in from Rotterdam. One of her crew was about to jump ship.
Zolner stopped in one of the cheap lunchrooms scattered along West Street that catered to seamen. It was across from a door in the wall beside a guard shack. Every seaman who stepped out had to show his papers to prove he had a job on a ship. Zolner ordered a cup of coffee and watched.
Antipov stepped through the door with three others. He was dressed like they were in a tight peacoat and flat cap, but his wire-thin silhouette and steel-frame eyeglasses were unmistakable. They showed their papers and crossed West Street. The three entered a blind pig. Antipov waited outside. He removed his glasses, polished them with a bandanna he pulled from his peacoat, then tied the bandanna around his neck.
Zolner joined him and they walked inland on a side street past unlit garages and shuttered warehouses.
Antipov spoke English with a heavy accent. “Where is Johann?”
“Dead. I’m glad you’ve come. I counted on him.”
“How did he die?”
“He was wounded by the Coast Guard. Police took him to the hospital. He knew too much.”
“Pity,” said Antipov.
“Needless to say, Fern believes he was shot by a detective.”
“Of course. Who are those men following us?”
At no point had either Russian appeared to look back.
“Neighborhood thugs,” answered Zolner. “They rob immigrants who sneak off the ships.”
Antipov stopped where the shadows were thickest. “Do you have a cigarette?”
“Of course.” Zolner shook a Lucky Strike out of the pack. Antipov struck a match, let the wind blow it out, and struck another and lit the cigarette, shielding the flame this time expertly. The charade gave the thugs time to catch up. Three Irish, Zolner noted, two of them half drunk, but not enough to slow them down. The third floated with a boxer’s smooth gait. They attacked without a word.
Zolner retreated to his right, Antipov to his left. To the thugs, they looked like frightened men stumbling into each other, but their paths crossed as smoothly as parts of a machine, and when they finished exchanging places in a dance as precise as it was confusing, the thug charging Zolner was suddenly facing Antipov, and the thug lunging at Antipov was facing Zolner. Zolner dropped his man with a blackjack. Antipov stabbed his with a long, thin dagger.
The boxer scrambled backwards. Zolner and Antipov blocked any hope of running back to West Street or ahead to Tenth Avenue. He opened his hands in the air to show he was not armed.
Antipov spoke as if he were not standing five feet away. “Would it not be ironic to fall at the hands of common criminals?”
“Not likely,” said Zolner.
The boxer, seeing that flight was hopeless, closed his big hands into ham-size fists and went up on the balls of his feet.
“He is brave,” said Antipov.
“And handles himself well,” said Zolner. “What is your name?”
“What’s it to you?”
“We are deciding whether to kill you. Or pay you.”
“Pay me? Pay me for what?”