The Apaches of New York

“An’ at that,” remarked Harrington, who had a practical knowledge of politics, “him an’ his mugwump bunch didn’t have nothin’ on th’ New York reformers. Do youse guys remember when the city bought th’ ferries? There was – ”

“I’d sooner hear Slimmy,” said Goldie Cora.

“Me too,” agreed the Wop.

Slimmy looked flattered. “Well, then,” he continued, “all this time Caesar is the big screech, an’ it makes Brutus so sore he gets to be a bug. So he starts to talkin’. ‘This Cæsar guy,’ says Brutus, ‘won’t do.’

“‘Right you be,’ says Cassius, who’s always been a kicker. ‘That’s what I’ve been tellin’ you lobsters from th’ jump.’

“With this an old souse named Casca sits up, an’ says he ain’t seen nothin’ wrong about Cæsar.

“‘Oh, roll over!’ says Cassius. ‘Why even the newsboys are on. You know Cæsar’s wardman – that fresh baby, Mark Antony? It’s ribbed up right now that at th’ Lupercal he’s to hand Cæsar a crown.’

“Casca an’ th’ other bone-heads turns to Brutus.

“‘Yes,’ says Brutus, answerin’ their looks; ‘Cassius has got good information. He’s givin’ youse th’ correct steer.’”

“An’ did Cæsar cop off the crown?” asked Goldie Cora, eagerly.

Slimmy shook his head.

“Th’ Lupercal comes ‘round,” said he, “an’ Mark Antony is there with bells on. He makes a funny crack or two about a crown, but nothin’ goes. Th’ wind-up is that Brutus, Cassius, Casca, an’ th’ rest of th’ Citizens’ Union, gang Cæsar later in th’ forum, go at him with their chives, an’ cut an’ slash till his hide won’t hold his principles.”

“An’ wasn’t there,” demanded the Wop, with heat, “so much as wan strong-arm la-a-ad up at Cæsar’s end av th’ alley, wit’ th’ nerve to git even?”

“Never fear!” returned Slimmy, reassuringly; “th’ day they plant Cæsar, Mark Antony goes in to make th’ funeral spiel. He’s th’ Roman Senator Grady, Mark Antony is, an’ he burns ‘em up. Brutus an’ his bunch get th’ tip up at their club house, an’ take it on th’ run. With that, Cæsar’s gang gets to goin’, an’ they stand Rome on its nut from the Capitoline Hill to the Tarpeian Rock. Brutus an’ the’ other mugwumps gets it where th’ baby wore th’ beads, an’ there ain’t been a Seth Low or a Fulton Cutting along th’ Tiber from that day to this. Oh, they’ve got us left standin’ sideways, them Guineas have, in some things.”

About the time Slimmy began his lucid setting forth of Brutus, Cæsar and their political differences, Ellison and Razor, down at Nigger Mike’s in Pell Street, were laying their heads together. A bottle of whiskey stood between them, for they required inspiration. There were forty people in the room, some dancing, some drinking, some talking. But no one came near Ellison and Razor, for their manner showed that they did not wish to be disturbed. As the Nailer observed, “They had a hen on,” and when gentlemen have a hen on they prefer being quiet.

“I’ve no use for Paul Kelly,” whispered Razor in response to some remark of Ellison’s. “You bet he knows enough not to show his snout along Eighth Avenue. He’d get it good if he did.”

“My notion,” said Ellison, “is to turn th’ trick right now.”

“Just th’ two of us?”

“Why not?”

“He’d have his guerillas; youse have got to figure on that.”

“They wouldn’t stand th’ gaff. It’s the difference between guys who knows what they wants, and guys who don’t. Once we started, they’d tear th’ side out the Brighton in the get-away.”

“All right,” said Razor, bringing down his hand; “I’m wit’ you.”

“Just a moment,” and Ellison motioned Razor back into his chair. “If Paul’s dancin’, we must stall him into th’ bar. I don’t want to hoit any of them skirts.”

It was the delightful habit of Slimmy, on the tail of one of his lectures, to order beer for his hearers. That’s why he was listened to with so much interest. Were every lecturer to adopt Slimmy’s plan, he would never fail of an audience. Also, his fame would grow.

Slimmy, having finished with Cæsar and the others, had just signed up to the waiter to go his merry rounds, when Ellison and Razor slipped in from the street. Their hands were on their guns, their eyes on Kelly.

Harrington saw it coming.

“Your gatt, Paul, your gatt!” he shouted.

The rule in Gangland is to let every man kill his own snakes. Harrington’s conduct crowded hard upon the gross. It so disgusted Razor that, to show Harrington what he thought of it, he half turned and laced a bullet through his brain.

“Now you’ve got something of your own to occupy your mind,” quoth Razor.

Ellison was too old a practitioner to be drawn aside by the Harrington episode. He devoted himself unswervingly to Paul Kelly. Ellison’s first bullet cut a hole through Kelly’s coat and did no further harm. The lights were switched out at this crisis, and what shooting followed came off in the dark. There was plenty of it. The air seemed sown as thickly full of little yellow spits of flame as an August swamp of fireflies. Even so, it didn’t last. It was as short lived as a July squall at sea. There was one thunder and lightning moment, during which the pistols flashed and roared, and then – stillness and utter silence!

It was fairish pistol practice when you consider conditions. Paul Kelly had three bullets in him when four weeks later he asked the coppers to come and get him. He had been up in Harlem somewhere lying low. And you are not to forget Harrington. There were other casualties, also, which the police and politicians worked hand in hand to cover up.

Five minutes went by after the shooting; ten minutes! – no one was in a hurry. At last a policeman arrived. He might have come sooner, but the New Brighton was a citadel of politics. Would you have had him lose his shield?

The policeman felt his official way into the barroom: – empty as a drum, dark as the inside of a cow!

He struck a match. By its pale and little light he made out the dead Harrington on the floor. Not a living soul, not even Goldie Cora!

Goldie Cora?

Said that practical damsel, when the matter was put up to her by Big Kitty, who being sentimental called Goldie Cora a quitter for leaving her dead love lying in his blood, “What good could I do? If I’d stuck I’d have got pinched; an’ then – me in th’ Tombs – I’d have stood a swell chance, I don’t chink, of bein’ at Bill’s funeral.”

THE END