Riders Down (17 page)
Authors: John McEvoy
There was a brief silence. Then Matt said, “Yes, it is really something. Thanks, Tommy. I’ll see you.”
Late that night in Madison, Bledsoe sat in his darkened office, listening with irritation to the rise and fall of a backyard cicada symphony. The August moon was nearly full, its light shining through the window and across the desk where he’d sat re-checking his math on a hand calculator. As he feared, he’d been correct when he’d first done the numbers in his head. “Damn,” he said, pounding one of his huge fists on the desk in frustration.
He had to grudgingly admit that, in a way, the situation bordered on black comedy, with him the butt of the joke.
Seven other Pick Four winners that afternoon! How unfair was that? All the planning, the work, that had gone into his brilliant scheme. To have it come to fruition, but then have to share the spoils with people who had nothing to do with the outcome of those races. He was wracked with resentment at yet another incident of betrayal in his life.
Bledsoe earlier had gone to his computer and pulled up the
Racing Daily
website seeking details of that afternoon’s events. He skimmed the main story that described the “shocking upset” that had taken place in the Prairie Schooner Handicap. He knew all about that. Another masterpiece of his very own design. How could he not feel satisfaction at the way it had come together, the way he had pulled the strings manipulating those jockey puppets
for the third time
. The main news report, well, that was one he’d have pasted in a leather-bound scrapbook, if he were foolish enough to own such a potentially incriminating item.
No, it was the sidebar story contributed to by
Racing Daily
staffers around the country that made his blood boil. The various correspondents had managed to track down four of that day’s National Pick Four winners. Two of them, obviously serious handicappers desiring to keep their profiles low, offered only “no comment” when asked how they had arrived at the winning combination of numbers. It was the other two who made Bledsoe curse.
One of the winners, Teresa Sparkman, Bledsoe read, “spent $20 on quick pick tickets sold at the Green Valley track in Oregon. One of those twenty $1 tickets proved to be a winner.”
Even more galling to Bledsoe was the Pick Four method successfully employed by the Jacoby brothers, Jack and Jake, electrical contractors who patronized Citrus Park in south Florida. “We play the National Pick Four every month or so,” Jake Jacoby said. “We meet at the South Winds Saloon in Hallandale, have a couple of beers, some sandwiches. Then we run through the names of the horses entered in the Pick Four races. We never once hit this bet before, though we came real close one time two years ago.
“Mark Madness,” Jake Jacoby continued, “we took him because Jack’s oldest boy is named Mark. Kid’s got kind of a temper. My mother-in-law’s name is Lisa, so we used Over at Lisa’s because the family has Sunday dinner at her house a lot. We just liked the name Graustark’s Memory for some reason, so we played him. Dim Donny? We’d had a few beers by the time we got to that race. I don’t remember how we came up with him. But it sure worked out great,” Jacoby laughed.
Bledsoe swore loudly as he turned off the computer. “Take these goofs out of the mix and I would have been okay. I would have been okay.” Forcing himself to take deep breaths, he finally sat back in his chair and again reviewed his calculations.
Deducting Jimbo and Vera’s twenty-five percent cut of today’s $350,000 after tax payoff left Bledsoe with $262,500. That added onto his net gain from the previous two scores gave him a total of $791,250, or $208,750 short of the million needed to earn Grandma Bledsoe’s big prize.
With less than three weeks to go to the September 19 deadline, Bledsoe faced a huge problem: there wasn’t another National Pick Four scheduled until the first Saturday of October. Too late.
He did some more mental calculations, then reached for the calculator to check them, too. According to his figures, Jimbo and Vera had thus far netted $263,750 from the manipulated races. He was certain that, because of his urging, they had spent very little of it. He’d been emphatic in cautioning them not to suddenly begin flashing cash, and he knew that they, out of a combination of fear (of him) and avarice, heeded what he’d had to say.
Yes, they had enough to put him over the top.
For the fifth straight 3 a.m. Randy Morrison, having gone sleepless for hours, conceded to his insomnia and got out of bed, leaving his wife, Dot, snoring softly, bedcovers pulled up to her chin. He walked down the hallway outside the bedroom door and looked in at their young son, Will, then moved to the patio door of the townhouse and stepped outside. The cloudless late summer sky was freckled with stars, and a breeze slid gently over the dew-soaked lawn.
On this night, as with all the others recently, Morrison could think of little else than the situation he was in concerning the mysterious Professor. Riding seven or eight mounts each day at Dell Park, with all the attendant pressure involved and concentration required, was not enough to derail his train of thought. Nor were the evening hours spent with his wife and son, for always lingering in the forefront of consciousness was a dilemma of a sort he had never before faced.
In fear of his life, he had already lost with Lord’s Heir and Rim Shot as the Professor had ordered. Would he be forced to lose other races? He feared so.
Morrison, as honest a jock as ever pulled on the white pants worn by working members of his trade, was sickened by the mess he was in and what he had been forced to do. Struggling with shock and loss after his half-brother was murdered, Randy also realized fully that the Professor did indeed have the ability and will to carry out his threats.
Normally one of the friendliest, most outgoing members of the Dell Park jockey colony, Randy had retreated into himself so markedly that his longtime friend and fellow rider, Bobby Brokopp, had pressed him for answers.
“What is it man?” Brokopp had asked quietly when training hours were over the previous morning and the two men sipped coffee at the counter in the track kitchen. “You got problems at home?” Morrison shook his head, but did not answer. Brokopp persisted. “I know that what happened to Eddie is still fresh in your mind. But you look to me like something else is hanging over you. What is it? Can I do anything for you? We go back a long way together, man,” Brokopp had pointed out.
Randy and Brokopp had known each other for nearly fifteen years, since they broke into racing at the same time as apprentice riders on the New Mexico minor circuit. They had been buddies through many good and bad times in the ensuing years, sharing the cheapest apartment they could find near Dell Park when they both had made the big move north to the major racing circuit and before each man had married. Brokopp had helped break up an ugly fight between Morrison and a drunken trainer who was bitterly disappointed by a string of losing horses he’d sent out, saving Morrison from both injury and suspension. Randy had rescued Brokopp from a potentially fatal injury when he’d reached out to prevent him from falling from a horse whose saddle had slipped badly in the course of a race. Randy had introduced Brokopp to his future wife, an exercise rider named Susanna Pratt. Each had been best man at the other’s wedding.
All that personal history failed to connect them now, however. Out of a combination of fear for his life and shame he felt for what he had done to preserve it, Randy had not been able to bring himself to confide in Brokopp, or Dot, or anyone else. “It’s nothing I can’t handle,” he’d said unconvincingly. “Just a little matter I’ve got to work out on my own.” He tossed his empty Styrofoam cup into a nearby waste container. “Got to go, man,” he said, turning away quickly so as to avoid further eye contact with Brokopp. “See you.”
Brokopp watched as Randy walked rapidly out the door and down the walkway past Steve Holland, one of the owners for whom he regularly rode, without acknowledging him. Holland looked at Randy’s retreating figure with surprise. Holland still looked puzzled when Brokopp approached. Brokopp nodded at Holland and shrugged his shoulders. “Good morning, Mr. Holland,” he said, adding, as he passed the owner, “I don’t know what’s going on with Randy, either.”
Now, as Randy Morrison sat on the picnic table bench, he was oblivious to the breeze moving softly through the palm trees that bordered his back yard, oblivious to the first pinkish hint of the new day cutting into the darkness of the horizon. He was oblivious to everything but the ominous voice he kept hearing in his head, the voice from the phone, saying over and over again
You will do what I say, or you will die. It’s as simple as that.
During the first such call, Randy had asked, “Who is this?” The only response was a soft laugh. The second and third times, the person on the other end of the line had said “You know who this is,” before laughing derisively. The last time the voice had added,
Just think of me as the
Professor, Randy. Someone teaching you to do what I want.
Randy had heard that voice often ever since, in his sleep, often during his waking hours. He found he did not have the power to escape that menacing sound.
The faces of the murdered jockeys floated through his memory. Eddie, Mark Guerin, Carlos Hidalgo—his half-brother and two men he knew well and had often ridden against. What had any of them done to deserve what had happened to them? What had
he
done to deserve this? His now almost continual headache returned. His fear of the Professor and his unwillingness to reveal to Dot what was going on, thus dragging her into his world of fear, were like locomotives heading straight for each other. He was the collision point.
Randy shivered in the cool air. Oddly enough, the next thought he had made him smile, for the first time in days. For some reason the memory of his uncle Don Morrison flashed into his head. Uncle Don had been a lifelong horse bettor, much given to a pair of sayings that became legendary in the family. When he was going good, the horses he bet were “running like rats in a barrel.” A far more frequently uttered statement was that which accompanied his losing streaks. “Where do you go to give up?” Uncle Don would ask plaintively.
“Uncle Don,” Randy said aloud, “I wish I knew the answer to that right now.”
But deep down Randy knew he could never quit riding, never walk away from the only thing he really knew how to do well, the only thing that he really loved doing. Not now, not at the peak of his career. Besides, even if he did retire, what assurance did he have that the Professor would not exact revenge upon him for that decision? This seemingly omnipotent mystery man was obviously able to do what he threatened to do. Unless Randy sealed himself in an armored car for the rest of his life, he would probably always be vulnerable. “I’ve got to do something,” Randy said as he got up from the bench. Dawn was now spreading rapidly across the eastern sky, and the sound of birds increased to greet it, but Randy took no notice. He went into the house, moving quietly, careful not to wake the family as he dressed and prepared to leave.
Ten minutes later as he drove toward Dell Park, Randy pounded the truck’s steering wheel with one fist. “I’ve had enough of this crap,” he said loudly. Randy’s thoughts turned to the man he knew best and trusted most in the Jockeys’ Union. “I’ve got to call Tyree Powell,” he said to himself. “If anybody can help me figure out what to do, it’d be him. Please, Lord, help me find my way here.”
Matt heard a voice slice through his sleep. Struggling to consciousness, he realized that the voice was his own. The bedside clock read 4:33 a.m. as he sat up and turned on his reading lamp. He shook his head, but the scene he’d just dreamed kept replaying, with him shouting repeatedly, “No, don’t jump, Randy…no…no.”
The setting in this dream involving jockey Randy Morrison was not the familiar one to Matt, the racetrack, but, of all things, a ski jump site. Matt was standing in a crowd of people at the foot of a steep slope, watching Morrison prepare to start his descent from the top of the jump. Low winter clouds let loose with wind-blown flurries of flakes. The people lining the hill shivered and stomped their feet in the frigid late afternoon weather.
Morrison was wearing jockey silks, red and white, and suddenly a bright sun broke through and glinted off his dark glasses. He spun one ski pole as he would a jockey’s whip, in a baton-twirling motion, before thrusting it into the snow beside where he stood hundreds of feet above the crowd. Then Morrison released and sped down the jump. Going airborne with a swoosh he passed above Matt, who by now had stopped urging him not to jump. Too late now. Morrison soared through the bright winter air, then abruptly descended. His skis came off his feet in midair. He plummeted and hit the slope with a ferocious impact. Morrison’s body shattered as he crashed, limbs filling the air like shrapnel as Matt looked on in horror. His continued shouts of “No…no…” were what finally awakened Matt.
“What the
hell
was that all about?” he muttered as he got out of bed. In the bathroom he leaned over the sink and splashed cold water on his sweaty face. Matt knew he would never get back to sleep tonight. Doubted that he would be able to sleep even had Maggie been here on one of her frequent overnights. Doubted that he would be able to sleep soundly for many nights as long as this jockey situation continued to dominate his thinking and rake his subconscious mind.
***
At nine o’clock that morning, Matt phoned Moe at his office, knowing he’d be there. Kellman worked out each morning from seven until eight-thirty at Fit City, the health club near his office, then “opened for business,” as he put it, at nine sharp. When his call was put through, Matt said, “Moe, I need to talk to you about this jockey thing,” then continued on hurriedly, “I think I know what’s going on, but as far as finding out who’s doing it, I’m stumped. I’m not getting anywhere, and I…”
“Whoa, whoa,” Moe interrupted, “you’re going too fast too early in the morning. Take it easy, kid. Let me get my tea.” There was a minute of silence before Moe said, “I’ll meet with you this afternoon, early. I’ve got an idea about this. Come down here to the office about 1:30. We’ll take a little trip out to River Forest to see Fifi Bonadio.”
***
Pete Dunleavy, Moe’s driver, whisked them out the Eisenhower Expressway and through the light early afternoon traffic in just under twenty-two minutes to First Avenue, their exit for River Forest. Earlier, passing Cicero Avenue, Matt looked out the car window to his right, past the line-up of garish billboards, smokestacks, battered-looking warehouses and desolate rail yards toward where old Prairie Park once stood as a thriving racing enterprise in this blue collar neighborhood. Prairie Park had hosted horse races for some seven decades. Then a decision was made to convert it to an auto racing complex, with horses relegated to a small chunk of the calendar. The decision proved to be disastrous, with both sports suffering financial losses leading to the closing of the entire facility and sale of the land. It still hurt Matt to think about it, for he had loved the old red brick stands with their seating close to the action, the aroma of grilled onions and Polish sausages on an early spring afternoon, the three card monte games conducted on blankets on the Laramie Avenue sidewalk, the loudly voiced opinions of the beer-fueled customers.
Moe didn’t give Dunleavy any directions as they drove. They had been to this address before. Dunleavy was one of three ex-Chicago policemen employed by Moe Kellman. All three had put in their twenty years for pension eligibility and gone to work for the furrier, all starting within three years of each other. Besides Dunleavy there was Bill Sheridan, Moe’s night driver, and Al Suppelsa, who provided a security presence at Moe’s office during working hours.
In addition to Dunleavy’s driving duties, Moe informed Matt as they rode westward on the expressway, Dunleavy was “believe it or not one of the best cooks of Italian food you’ll ever run into, even if he is a Mick like you.” In the rearview mirror, Matt could see Dunleavy grinning as Moe said, “He makes the best escarole soup in the city. His penne with the vodka and cream sauce, the veal meatballs, the spinach ravioli…Well, you got to come up to the office one of these Wednesdays. Pete puts out an Italian buffet for my staff and some of my best customers every week. You could get a good sampling there.
“This guy is so good,” Moe said, “that when I go on fishing trips with my buddies we take Pete along just to cook for us. Fifi says Pete’s raviolis are as good as his Ma used to make. We brought along a pan of them for him today.”
Matt was curious. “Where did you get such a taste for Italian food?” he said to Moe. Smiling, Moe said, “You think I should be into just brisket and knishes? Listen, where I grew up on the near west side, it was all dagoes and Jews. I had a lot of friends in each camp, probably more in the former. I ate at their houses as often as I could. My mother was the worst cook in the ward. You could have played bocce with her matzo balls. A lot of those guys are still my friends today. And clients, like Fifi.” Moe shrugged. “Who would’ve thought Fifi would wind up head of the Chicago Outfit. He started out as a burglar—and a bad one.”
Puzzled, Matt said, “If he was a lousy burglar, how’d he get where he is?”
“He got into some other things he was better at.” Moe did not elaborate.
The Lincoln turned down a quiet elm-shaded street and stopped before a tall iron gate. Out of the small brick office to the left of the driveway came a man wearing a blue windbreaker and black slacks and a Chicago Bears ball cap turned backwards. “That’s Rick Fasulo,” Moe said. “Remember him when he played tackle for the Bears? He’s worked for Feef ever since he blew out a knee and had to retire.”
Fasulo nodded at Dunleavy, then leaned down and in a voice roughened by too many forearms to the larynx, spoke through the open window. “Afternoon, Mr. Kellman. Mr. Bonadio’s expecting you.” He pressed a remote control button and the gates opened.
They drove up a long, paved driveway that curved in front of a three-story stone mansion complete with turrets, five chimneys, wings that extended widely from the sides of the original structure, and a front entrance tall and wide enough to drive a pair of Clydesdales through.
The mansion had been built early in the previous century for one of Chicago’s more successfully rapacious meat packing magnates, who had demanded, and gotten, something baronial for himself. Fifi Bonadio’s additions to this gabled, gray stone monstrosity were in keeping with the original style, proof that the taste of these two ambitious Chicago profiteers, although separated in time by many years, was similarly awful.
As Dunleavy waited in the car, Moe said, “Matt, give me a hand here will you? Carry this in.” He handed Matt a large aluminum pan containing the raviolis. “Be careful,” he said, “the sauce is on them.” Moe reached into the trunk and extracted a rectangular white box. “This is the coat Feef wants to look at for Tiffany,” he said. The mansion’s front door was opened by a slim, dark-complexioned man wearing a blue suit and dark glasses. Moe said, “How you doing, Ralphie?”
“Not bad, Mr. Kellman. Just put the food down on that table,” he added. “I’ll have one of the maids take it to the kitchen.”
Following the man down the lengthy hallway, they passed a huge living room, a large library on one side of the carpeted corridor, a vast dining room on the other. The hallway walls were covered with artwork, some of it recognizable to Matt. Both old and modern masters were represented. Matt whistled softly through his teeth as they walked. “Is that a real Monet?” he whispered. Moe gave him a sidelong glance. “Don’t ask.”
Moe nodded in the direction of a dreadful piece of Midwestern art fair kitsch that was prominently displayed in mid-corridor. “Some of Feef’s stuff is great, some of it is bad taste on steroids,” he said as they passed a wide staircase with gleaming banisters on both sides and neared the end of the corridor. A bulky, blond-haired bodyguard rose from his chair as they approached, but said nothing. Ralphie opened the door, stood aside, and ushered them through.
They entered an expansive room that looked to Matt like the interior of a very upscale sports bar. A half-dozen television sets embedded in the walls were turned to various sporting events around the country, another to a stock market channel, the sound off on each. Sinatra sang over a magnificent audio system, sounding as if he were standing beside them. Light poured in from a wide glass wall at the rear of the room. Hundreds of autographed photos of athletes, politicians, and other entertainers lined all of two walls and half of the third. The rest of that wall was taken up by glass-enclosed cases packed with trophies won by various sixteen-inch softball, bowling, and bocce teams sponsored by Bonadio Construction (“We Make the Earth Move”), one of Fifi’s numerous business interests. Beyond the glass wall was an Olympic-sized swimming pool and two tennis courts. The pool and the courts were empty.
The man seated behind the wide, leather-topped desk was talking softly on the phone. He gestured toward chairs in front of the desk as he continued, meanwhile waving a jumbo cigar in the air as if he were conducting an invisible orchestra. Bushy black eyebrows contrasted with the whiteness of his thick head of hair. His deeply tanned face was long, chin strong, lips thin, and his restless eyes were as black as a monsignor’s suit. Fifi Bonadio would be considered handsome, Matt thought, were it not for the artless presence of a formidable Roman nose with its strikingly large nostrils.
Bonadio was wearing a yellow cashmere sweater, open-collared white shirt, black linen trousers, and black loafers. There were two rings on each of his hands, Matt noticed, each one larger than a good-sized walnut. Finally, Bonadio put the phone down. He stood up and came around from behind the desk. Moe stood, too, and the two men embraced, Bonadio beaming down at his boyhood friend. “Great to see you, Moe,” he said. “Have a seat.” He turned to Matt, waiting. Moe said, “Feef, this is my friend I’ve been telling you about, Matt O’Connor.”
The Outfit boss nodded coldy at Matt but made no effort to shake his hand. The three men sat down again. Matt looked past Bonadio and out the window. On the other side of the pool and tennis courts there was a lawn about half as long and wide as a football field. A half-dozen Mexican laborers were busy maintaining this green, tree-dotted expanse, under the watchful eyes of two bodyguards. There was a grape arbor in the northeast corner of the lot. “This cheapskate still makes his own dago red,” Moe had confided on the drive out. A ten-foot-tall concrete wall bordered three sides of the property. Electrical security wires that ran along the tops of the walls, and black security cameras visible in the trees, marred the otherwise sylvan scene—a reminder of the harsh realities extant in Fifi Bonadio’s world.
It was silent in the room for a few moments. Matt could almost feel the hard-eyed gaze Bonadio directed at him. Then the Mob chief said, “You gotta understand, O’Connor, that you’re the first newspaper guy I’ve talked to in thirty years. I’m not like my former asshole goombah in New York, the ‘dapper’ one, who made himself so famous he’s locked up in Ossining. I don’t deal with the press, and neither does my family, except for my son, when he played football. That’s a different world, his world.”
Pointing his cigar for emphasis, Bonadio continued addressing Matt. “What I’m saying here is that I’ve agreed to meet with you as a favor to my friend here,” Bonadio said, indicating Moe. “So, what’s your story?”
Matt cleared his throat. “You remember when Moe’s Uncle Bernie died?” Matt began. Bonadio interrupted him. “Remember? I was a pallbearer, for chrissake. Bernie and I did business for years.”
Matt pressed on. “Moe thought at the time that Bernie had been murdered, that it wasn’t suicide. He thought it may have been in connection to my business, which is horse racing. There were indications that Bernie had had contact with some professor, who convinced Bernie he was using him as a prime source for a study of gambling. Bernie had several contacts with this guy, according to what he told Moe.”
Matt reached into his sport coat pocket and extracted his reporter’s notebook. He riffled through pages with notations such as “Charlie Whitson, Calif. trainer, coming in to work his big horse Tuesday…Maggie’s running two of hers next Monday…Call stewards for comment on Callaway’s suspension…” until he found what he was looking for. Bonadio impatiently tapped a pencil on his desktop.
“Not long ago,” Matt said, “a good friend of mine, a big bettor, super sharp guy, brought to my attention some very suspicious races at tracks around the country. These races involved top-notch jockeys losing on favorites in National Pick Four races. When they did, the payoffs were huge. I’ve got all the information right here. There were only a few tickets sold on the winning combinations. Three of those winning tickets were sold here in Chicago at Heartland Downs.”
Matt closed the notebook and sat silently for a few moments, slapping it nervously against his knee. Finally, he said, “I guess what I need to know, Mr. Bonadio, is if you or your people have anything to do with these unusual race results.”
The next sound in the room was that of instantaneous laughter. It poured forth from Bonadio, who sat back in his leather chair, head raised to the ceiling, letting the mirth flow out. Matt felt his face becoming flushed. He looked at Moe, who signaled him to say nothing. So they waited, until Bonadio stopped laughing and leaned forward in his chair. “O’Connor,” he finally said, an amused look still present in his eyes, “do you think for one fucking minute that if I
did
have anything to do with shit like that that I’d
tell
you about it? Are you fucking nuts?” He shook his head, marveling at the naivete of Matt’s question. Then he looked at Moe.
