Champion of the World (24 page)

“Let me share some advice with you, Mrs. Van Dean,” he said. “The truth of our situation is that you're not bringing much to the table here. I came down tonight because I don't think my business partners would be very happy with any eventuality that called attention to this place or led to their star Negro getting killed for no reason. You? Those men can have you for all I care.”

“Hey, now—” Taft said.

“And you,” Eddy said, “if you want me to keep covering for you and our friend Dr. Paulson, I suggest you don't put me in a situation like this again.”

Taft opened his mouth as if to say something but didn't. Eddy started up the hill, his arms and legs now feeling very heavy, like he wanted to curl up on his cot and sleep for a thousand years.

“What if those men come back for her?”

This was Taft's voice from behind him. He considered it and turned to face them. “That doesn't sound like my problem,” he said.

He left them that way, climbing back up the hill to his room and changing out of his pants. He thought of going up to see if he could rouse Templeton, the big, spiritless man who was supposed to be in charge of the Canadians. He knew it wouldn't do any good, though, and anyway, the rage that had been seething in his chest had been replaced by a new feeling. For the first time in a long time he could see the future opening up in front of him. He had the urge to drive into town right then, call O'Shea on the telephone, get him out
of bed and tell him exactly where he could stick this job. What had he called it that day back in Chicago? An important supervisory position? That was a laugh, and Eddy—sitting at his desk chair in the cold room in just his skivvies—nearly did laugh now at the thought of all of it.

He still wasn't totally sure why he'd agreed to set up that first meeting between Mundt, O'Shea and Stettler. To think about it now made him feel bewildered all over again. As he remembered it, his dealings with Mundt seemed to take on the quality of a runaway train. As if as soon as the wrestler opened his mouth there had been no stopping it, though Eddy's mind may have added that sense of things afterward. He should've told Mundt to take a hike that first night in the speakeasy, but he hadn't. Maybe he'd brokered the meeting as a show-off move meant to tell Mundt—and maybe prove to himself—that he could still get O'Shea in a room if he needed to. At first Mundt had been coy about exactly what proposition he had, but he made it clear it was something big. There was no shame in at least hearing him out, Eddy had told O'Shea, even though his friend was dubious that a retired meat tosser and small-time leg breaker could have anything that would interest him.

They met in O'Shea's office above the tailor's shop in River North. O'Shea brought in a couple of his new men, goons in outfits they'd bought downstairs, whom Eddy disliked with an intensity he knew could only be jealousy. Billy Stettler showed up alone, his strongman body stuffed inside a tight suit and his hair dyed a preposterous shade of midnight black, so dark it looked almost blue against his scalp. The rumor going around was that Stettler had been injecting himself with monkey hormones to increase his bulk. Eddy wasn't sure he could believe that. It seemed like the kind of story a schoolboy would make up. Where would you even get something like that? Bribe a zookeeper?

At least Stettler hadn't brought Stanislaw Lesko, a man Eddy
considered so brutishly stupid he lowered the collective intelligence of any room he entered. The fact that the world's heavyweight champion wasn't there, either, meant Stettler wasn't interested in what Mundt had to say, or that he was so interested he didn't want Lesko to know about it yet. Eddy imagined Stettler leaving a bowl of food on the floor when he left the house so the wrestler wouldn't starve to death while he was out. He smiled at the image even though he noticed that, despite being the one who set up the meeting, he'd been left to stand by the window while O'Shea and Stettler took chairs around a small table with a coffeepot and a plate of cookies.

Mundt showed up exactly on time, looking like his life had made a complete rebound since Eddy had last seen him. He sported a fresh manicure, and his mustache had been styled with wax that smelled strongly of licorice. He came into the room shaking hands and slapping backs—his eyes no longer glowing with drunkenness—smiling as if they'd all come there to congratulate him on the birth of a new baby.

It took a few agonizing minutes for everyone to get settled. While they poured coffee and O'Shea offered to send out for sandwiches, Eddy felt his mind getting wrapped tighter and tighter. Social gatherings had a way of winding him up, and these awkward moments of small talk before the real business began were almost more than he could bear. Finally Mundt settled into his chair. He thanked both men for meeting with him and thanked Eddy for setting it up. He said he knew they were busy, so he would do his best not to keep them longer than he needed.

“We all have problems,” Mundt said, “but I have a solution that I think could make us all very rich men.”

Eddy watched O'Shea and Stettler as Mundt talked, both of them looking at him as if a traveling salesman had just promised to show them the sharpest set of kitchen knives they'd ever seen. They
exchanged a glance, which Eddy read as saying,
We're already rich men.
Stettler had his legs crossed at the knee and his hands folded primly in his lap. O'Shea began tugging absentmindedly at his right earlobe. For the first time Eddy felt a small bell toll in his chest, because he knew this was a tic of his, something O'Shea did when he was trying not to look interested.

“Do tell,” Stettler said with an exaggerated enthusiasm. “What problems do you mean?”

Mundt turned in his seat. “You,” he said, pointing a sturdy finger, “have already put down a security deposit on a date at the Garden in New York at the end of the year, but have nobody the public would pay a buffalo nickel to see wrestle Stanislaw Lesko.”

“We're going to get Joe Stecher,” Stettler protested, though his face said he knew it was a lame reply.

Mundt ignored him, turning to O'Shea. “And you,” he said. “I understand the police recently raided your brewery on Pacific Avenue. A half million dollars in losses, is that right? Not a crippler, maybe, but quite a setback. It certainly puts you a step behind our friends from the other side of town, does it not?”

O'Shea's round face had only grown more amused as Mundt talked. He turned to Stettler, the corners of his eyes crinkling. “Mr. Mundt reads the papers,” he said. Then back to Mundt: “All right, sir, you have my ear. Supposing these terrible, debilitating ailments you speak of are real: What tonic do you propose?”

The tone in his voice was mocking, but Mundt didn't seem to notice. Eddy imagined he'd probably practiced this speech a dozen times at home in front of a mirror and now he was going to stick to his pitch no matter what happened. Mundt spread his hands like a magician about to perform his biggest trick.

“Montana,” he said.

“Montana?” O'Shea said, the way you repeat something back when you're not sure you heard it right.

“It's a state,” Mundt said. “It happens to be my home state. You know where it is?”

There was a dangerous second when everyone in the room appeared to be trying to figure out if he was putting them on. O'Shea shifted in his seat. Stettler sat as still as a cat about to pounce. Eddy felt the cold of the window behind him, pressing into his back. Earlier, he'd told Mundt he would be very angry if he'd gone through the trouble of setting up this meeting just so the wrestler could pour garbage in their ears.

When O'Shea spoke again, he went very slowly, willing to play along for the moment but not sure where any of this was leading. “Sure,” he said. “Out west somewhere.”

Mundt grinned, his face sweaty and glowing. “Exactly what I thought,” he said
. “
Let me tell you a thing or two about Montana, the state where I was born, the state where I vacation each summer and where I continue to harbor many important contacts.”

Eddy thought he might suffocate on pure embarrassment. He pushed himself up from the windowsill as if to call things off, but Mundt kept going. “It's the third-biggest state in the union, did you know that?” he said. “It goes Texas, California, then Montana.”

“That's terrific,” Stettler said.

“Isn't that something,” O'Shea added, looking at Eddy like
Let's
wrap this up.

“Montana is six hundred thirty miles across, and yet the population is less than half the population of the city of Chicago,” Mundt said. “It's cold and empty and mountainous as all get-out, and do you know how many Prohibition agents there are in the whole state?”

“Tell me,” O'Shea said.

“Twelve,” Mundt said. “A dozen federal officers trying to cover an area of land roughly three times the size of the state of Illinois. Hell, half the towns out there still have saloons up and running in broad daylight.”

“Sounds like a great place to plan a party,” O'Shea said. “What's it got to do with us?”

Mundt held one hand flat and said: “Montana is here.” He lifted his other hand, put it on top. “Canada is here. You starting to get the picture?”

“Not really,” O'Shea said. “I don't know anybody in Canada.”

Now Mundt grinned back at him. “I do.”

O'Shea inched forward in his seat, still doing his best to sound disinterested. “You're saying it'd be an easy place to import booze,” he said.

“Not just to import,” Mundt said. “To stockpile.”

O'Shea snorted. “Okay,” he said. “I'll bite. Why would I want to stockpile liquor a thousand miles away?”

Eddy took a step back and resumed his position against the window as Mundt started talking again. O'Shea had forgotten about him for the moment.

“Actually, it's more like fourteen hundred miles,” Mundt said, “and I'll tell you exactly why.”

Mundt said that in the time between when the federal government approved the Volstead Act and when it actually went into effect, nearly everybody had tucked some hooch away. The big social clubs in Chicago and New York filled storerooms with it. Saloonkeepers and café owners piled crates in their basements so they could have a bottle under the counter for their favorite customers. Everybody's grandma had a jug hidden somewhere, Mundt said. In Chicago, guys like O'Shea and John Torrio scrambled to get stills set up, and all over the country men who knew there was money to be made started bringing liquor in from Canada or Cuba or Mexico or wherever was closest.

“But eventually,” Mundt said, “you're all going to run dry. Maybe not forever, but there's going to come a day when the great city of Chicago suffers a booze shortage.”

“And?” O'Shea said.

“And that's our moment,” Mundt said. “All we need is a couple of days' head start and,
boom
, just in the nick of time a dozen pallets of O'Shea liquor slide into town on some anonymous train car.”

The phrase was not lost on Eddy:
O'Shea liquor
. He snorted and the noise seemed to startle everyone. “That's ludicrous,” he said. “What are we even talking about here?”

“Yeah,” said Stettler, dry as winter sun. “I admire your collection of state facts, Fritz, but I'm getting bored. What could be in Montana that would possibly be of any interest to me?”

The first-name basis and Stettler's tone were unmistakable. It occurred to Eddy that he and Mundt probably knew each other from the wrestling business. If Mundt had taken over for Abe Blomfeld after the old man died, Stettler probably viewed him as competition.

“What's there for you, Billy,” Mundt said, “is the biggest forgotten drawing card in professional wrestling. The opponent who is going to pull your ass out of the fire and save you from losing your shirt trying to sell the sporting public Stan Lesko versus Joe Stecher for the fourth time.”

Stettler obviously didn't care for his tone. “Who?” he asked.

Mundt was taking a sip of his coffee, and it took him a moment to answer. After he'd set his cup on his saucer, he said, “Garfield Taft.”

At the mention of the name, Eddy felt the whole room deflate. Maybe Mundt had gotten them all going for a moment, but now he'd lost the momentum. With an exaggerated swing, Stettler uncrossed his legs and stood up. “I'm leaving,” he said.

O'Shea held up his hand. “Sit down,” he said.

Stettler didn't like that, but he sat. Eddy was surprised but then recalled that O'Shea had been fascinated with the Garfield Taft case when it was in the news a few years before. Each morning during the trial he insisted they nab a paper from the corner so he could sit at a
little outdoor café and read it. As hard a man as he was, O'Shea could be like that, taken with show business and sporting stars, captivated by the stories and the big personalities. As he read aloud from the accounts of Taft's capture and subsequent trial, he would glance up at Eddy and say something like “How do you figure that, Jimmy? A Negro and all those white women. Sakes alive.” Eddy, who usually had his nose buried in his own paper, would have to shrug and say he had no idea.

Now O'Shea regarded Mundt with a new curiosity. “If I recall correctly, Taft hailed from Ohio,” he said. “What would he be doing way out in Montana?”

“He'll be there because that's where I'll put him,” Mundt said, “to prepare for our shot at the world's heavyweight championship.”

Stettler threw his hands up, flabbergasted, looking like a guy showing the size of the fish that got away. Mundt went on, launching into much of the same sob story he'd told Eddy when they'd run into each other at the speakeasy. Abe Blomfeld was dead, his wrestling outfit was failing and Mundt had exhausted his credit with what he called “all the normal channels.” One day, out of the blue, Taft had come into the gym. He needed a place to stay and a promoter willing to give him a shot at a comeback. He was newly free from prison, eager to get back in the business and, in Mundt's professional opinion, still looked quite physically capable of doing it. Mundt reminded them that Taft had been undefeated when he'd been arrested, that there had been rumors that Joe Stecher was on the verge of granting him a championship opportunity.