Corruption of Blood (40 page)

He spotted a likely house, a small, lime green concrete-block-stucco with a gray tile roof, barely visible behind a wall of purplish crotons. He drove past it, stopped, and walked back to check. The number was printed on a sheet of shiny tin half-buried in the croton bushes. It was the right number. The people for whom Caballo worked had kept good track of Angelo Guel

Caballo went back to his car and drove to a gas station on Flamingo, where he bought a tin two-gallon fuel can and had it filled with gas. He put it in his trunk, next to his golf bag. Then he visited an auto parts store nearby and made a few more purchases. Next he had lunch in a Cuban restaurant, and after lunch found a movie theater and watched two features in Spanish, twice. During the second show he had a refreshing nap.

When he emerged it was past eight and dark. He drove to Guel’s house and went past the low, chain-link gate and through the dark wall of the crotons. Then he walked around the house to the back.

At the rear door, he pulled from his pocket the paper bag from the auto parts store and removed a four-inch flashlight, a roll of gaffer’s tape, and a heavy pliers. He taped one of the narrow jalousie panes of the rear door, snapped the pane in two silently with the pliers, pulled out the pane, unlocked the door, stripped off the tape, and replaced the pane in its slot. Then he went in.

Guel was not at home. The thin man checked the refrigerator, which contained half a paper case of Bud and some condiments. He took a can, cracked it, and settled down to wait in the dark.

“This is bullshit,” said Karp. “I’m not going to wait around this goddamn motel for Tony to decide if he’s going to tell us did he find Guel or not. And just you and Al cruising around town trying to find him is hopeless.”

It was the afternoon of the second day after Mosca’s murder, and Karp and Fulton were indeed hanging around their government-rate motel, the Arrowhead, off Brickell in Miami proper. They were at the side of the tiny pool, sitting in uncomfortable aluminum armchairs. When it had become clear that they were stuck in Miami for some time, Karp had broken down and purchased a pair of wash-and-wear tan slacks and a couple of short-sleeved shirts. The sporty look was constrained by the thick cordovans he continued to wear on his feet. Fulton was a good deal more Miami in flip-flops, plaid Bermudas, and a Hawaiian shirt printed with a banana motif.

“What do you suggest, boss? It’s police work. It requires patience, which you ain’t got. I tell you what, why don’t you go back to D.C. and I’ll stay down here and work the streets with Al. You can wear your suit again.”

Karp seemed not to hear this. He was staring at the water, lost in thought. Suddenly he sprang up and walked quickly back to their room. He returned fifteen minutes later.

“Let’s go!”

“Where’re we going, Butch? We told Al we’d meet him here at four.”

“FBI. They have a tap on Tony’s phone.”

Fulton gaped in surprise. “How the fuck did you find that … oh, yeah, your buddy in New York. You called what’s-his-name, Pillman. The Feeb.”

“He’s a Feeb, but he’s not my buddy. He’s an unindicted felon and I have his ass in my hands and I get to squeeze it in the public interest about once a year. He set things up so we can get a feed from the phone tap. We have to see a guy named Lorrimer.”

Lorrimer was a tall, clean-cut gentleman with graying brown hair who treated Karp and Fulton like a pair of piss-bums who had wandered in off Flagler Street.

“You’re not going to screw up this investigation,” he stated in steely tones when they arrived at his downtown office and explained what they wanted.

“Of course not,” said Karp. “All we’re after is any information that’s conveyed to Buonafacci about a man named Angelo Guel.”

“How come he’s looking for Guel?” asked Lorrimer.

“Pure coincidence,” Karp lied. “We got a tip that he was, is all.”

“Uh-huh. And this Guel figures in the Kennedy investigation? What, as the umbrella man?” He used the tone that the FBI adopts when citizens offer accounts of being abducted by flying saucers.

Karp ignored this. “Timing is the thing. We need to get to him before Tony does. I want to be at the tap site.”

After some meaningless argument—meaningless because in the FBI, New York swings a deal more weight than Miami, and both of them knew that Karp was going to get what he wanted anyway—Lorrimer made a couple of phone calls, and half an hour later Fulton and Karp were sitting in a room in a house on Sixty-third Street in North Miami Beach, across from the La Gorce Golf Course, off of which Tony Bones had his spacious home.

The observation house was vacant and unfurnished except for some camp beds and folding chairs and tables. The Feds had rented it because it afforded a good view of the front of the target dwelling and because it was convenient to the phone lines that served the gangster. In an upstairs room, several agents took turns looking through an immense tripod-mounted telescope, while in the back, another set of agents manned the tap.

“What about the phone at the Bal Harbour?” asked Karp when the agent at the tap had explained the layout.

“We got that too,” the man replied. “The material from that line is fed into that machine over there. When the sun goes down, they’ll break from the hotel, fart around at a couple of clubs, and get home about eleven, twelve. We got bugs on his usual tables, and a couple trucks that follow them around and pick up the radio feed from the bugs and send them to this radio here. That gets taped too. This is Tony Central.”

They spent the next day there, Fulton and Karp sleeping on the camp beds in shifts, listening to Mafia talk over the taps, growing bored and seedy. Each of them went out once to get toilet things and a change of clothes.

At eleven-thirty on the afternoon of the second day, the home phone rang and was answered by a man the tap agent identified as Joey Cuccia. The caller said, “This is Vince. Tony there?”

“No, he ain’t. Vince who?”

“Vince Malafredo. Who’s this, Joey?”

“Yeah. What you got, Vince?”

“Yeah, that picture? Jimmy Ace and a couple of the fellas was by couple nights ago showin’ it around. I know the guy. I thought I knew him, but like, I wasn’t sure, you know. Now I know. He came in the joint and placed a bet on the dogs.”

“So? He got a name?”

“Yeah.” A pause. “This is for a yard, right?”

“Yeah, yeah, a yard. What, you don’t think we’re good for it? Who’s the scumbag and where can we find him?”

“Right. He calls himself Angie Cruz. Runs a bunch of those Cubano coffee stands, sandwich joints. Lives here in Hialeah.” The man gave an address on Fifty-fourth Street. “It’s off Flamingo Way.”

Karp and Fulton were in the Pontiac forty seconds later, tearing off east on Sixty-third, Karp flapping through a street map, calling out directions.

It took them forty minutes to get to Hialeah via the Seventy-ninth Street Causeway and 823, and twenty minutes more to find the lime green house among the numberless others on the identical streets.

Karp leaped out of the car and trotted up the path and rang the bell.

“He’s not home,” Karp said after five minutes of ringing.

“Maybe he’s at work,” said Fulton. “I mean, it’s the middle of the day.”

“We’ll wait.”

“Let’s get something to eat. Then we’ll wait.”

“Takeout,” said Karp. “We’ll eat in the car.”

Fulton sighed. “Man, you ever done a stakeout before?”

“No. Why, is it hard?”

“With you in the car, it’s gonna be a bitch,” said Fulton, and stalked off down the path.

They bought a couple of Cuban sandwiches each, two six-packs of Coke and a bag of ice and a styro box to keep the ice and the Coke in, and called Al Sangredo to come and relieve them at eleven that evening.

They waited, watching the breeze shift the crotons, watching the shadows change on the street. It was not too warm, about seventy-five; they kept the windows open. Karp learned how to pee into a can.

Around two-thirty, a green Plymouth rolled down the street slowly and pulled into a space opposite Guel’s house. The driver kept the motor running. This attracted the attention of the two men in the Pontiac.

“Crap, it’s Tony’s guys,” said Karp in a pained voice.

“Nah, no way!” Fulton scoffed. “Wrong car. You ever see wise guys in a Plymouth?”

“Not touring, but who knows what they use when they whack people? What should we do?”

“Just wait,” said Fulton. They waited, watching the blue exhaust from the Plymouth curl up into the air. “Uh-oh, he’s getting out.”

The man in the green car had turned off his engine at last and now stood on the curb, slowly looking both ways.

“It’s Guel,” said Fulton between his teeth when the man looked their way. He had gained some weight since his guerrilla days, and was now a tubby man, with a higher hairline and a thicker mustache. He wore heavy sunglasses, a white guayabera shirt, and rumpled gray slacks. He hadn’t shaved in a while.

Karp doubted he had just returned from gainful employment. “What’s he so nervous about?”

“You’d be nervous too, if the word was out on the street that a Mafia don wanted a personal interview, plus a hood you knew in the old days had just been whacked. Okay, he’s decided the coast is clear, he’s crossing the street. What I think we sh—Hey, Butch, what the fuck!”

Karp had flung open his door and was heading at a good clip down the street after Guel.

“Ah, excuse me, Mr. Guel?” he called out. “Could I talk to you a—”

Guel whirled, his eyes wide.

Karp stopped talking as something big and heavy struck him in the small of the back. He saw the pavement rise up at him and he threw his hands forward to protect his face. He heard several loud sounds as he crashed into the asphalt.

There was a devastating pain in his midsection, and he struggled to bring air into his lungs. His hands stung from road burn and a weight was bearing down on his back. He was strangling. Another explosion, much louder. His ears rang. There was a brown forearm braced in front of his face. Fulton.

“Clay, goddamn it … ,” Karp choked out. He could barely hear his own voice above the ringing in his ears.

“Stay there!” Fulton ordered. Karp felt the weight leave his back. He lifted his head and saw Fulton dash, crouched, gun in hand, across the street to Guel’s house, kneel behind the croton hedge, and look cautiously around it. A door slammed, sounding very far away.

Karp rose painfully to his feet, took a few deep breaths, and inspected his scraped and bleeding hands. He walked to where Fulton knelt. Fulton motioned him down with an abrupt gesture. “Christ, Butch! Didn’t you see he had a gun?”

Karp shook his head.

“You gotta be blind! It was in his belt under that shirt. He could’ve had a fuckin’ sign on him, armed and dangerous. And antsy. Didn’t you see him go for it?”

Karp cleared his throat and took several deep breaths. “Hell, no! All I saw was him walking away and then he turned and then you sacked me. I guess you had to do that, right?”

“Unless you wanted another eyehole. Goddamn, Butch! Talk about dumb-ass stupid …” He flapped his mouth soundlessly, as if unable to find words adequate to the stupidity.

“Hey, what do I know? I’m not a cop,” objected Karp weakly, flushing now with embarrassment.

“You sure the fuck ain’t. And speaking of which, Counselor, neither am I anymore, and especially not in this fucking municipality which we is now in. What the fuck’re we supposed to do now?”

Inside the darkened house, Caballo stood flat against the kitchen wall, barely breathing, his little pistol cocked in his hand. He had been awakened from a light doze by the ringing of the doorbell some hours since. He had no idea who had rung the bell or where they were now. Obviously it was not Guel, and just as obviously somebody else was expecting Guel to return home. After the bell ringers left, he had eaten some cold beans from a can. Guel apparently liked black Cuban beans; Caballo had found a dozen or so cans in a cupboard and he had been living on them for the past three days, that and beer. He had also searched the back bedrooms and the bathroom, just to keep himself busy. He had found a tin box full of cash, which he’d taken, but nothing of significance.

When the shots outside sounded, he had placed the food and utensils under the sink and pressed his back against the kitchen wall to the left of the doorway. It was the right place to be. Behind the wall he leaned against, the living room led to the front door on one side and a Florida room opposite. The back door opened on the Florida room. The kitchen was to the right of the living room, connecting by an open archway. Another archway led from the kitchen to a short hall and two small bedrooms and a bath.

He heard the front door opening, then slamming shut. Steps. Heavy breathing. A rustling sound. Guel was looking out his front window, pushing aside the rattan blinds. Caballo tensed. More footsteps, coming closer. Guel rushed by him on the way to the bedrooms. To get his cash.

Caballo took a silent step, extended his arm, and fired twice at the back of Guel’s head at a range of about four feet. The man collapsed. Caballo leaned over the prostrate Cuban and fired three more shots into the base of Guel’s skull. Then he walked out through the rear door.

“What the hell was that?” asked Fulton, peering cautiously around the foliage, his pistol clutched high in both hands.

“What?” Karp was still crouched next to him, holding his hands out as if he had just done his nails, so that the blood dripping from his palms would not get all over him.

“Didn’t you hear it? It sounded like shots. From in the house.”

“Well, shit, Clay, we know he’s got a gun.”

“No, not
his
gun, another gun. Guel had a big piece, a .38 or a .357. This was like a little gun, a .22, four or five shots. Didn’t you hear it?”

“No, my ears are still ringing from when you shot at him over my head.” He paused and listened, trying to ignore the ringing. “Hey, I heard
that
.”

“Yeah, the door; our boy just went out the back.”

Karp jumped to his feet and started to walk around the hedge, but Fulton cursed, grabbed him by the belt, and yanked him back down again. “Stay here, damn it! I oughta cuff your damn ankle to the fence, and I would, if I had cuffs.”