Hell's Gate by Richard E. Crabbe Page B

ye’re after.”
    â€œMickey Todt; you know him?” Mike said, forgetting that they’d decided not to mention him. He gave an apologetic smirk to Primo.
    â€œStolzenthaler, that fuck! See these?” the cobbler said, holding up his hands. “Miserable prick tol’ me he’d break a finger a week till I paid ’im ’is protection money. Held out eight weeks,” he said proudly. “Couldn’t stand ’im breakin’ me thumbs though. Can’t make a livin’ without me thumbs.” The cobbler looked at them sharply. “What’s that gutter scum done now?”
    â€œNothing good,” Mike said with a look at Primo. “You know where we can find him?”
    â€œYou boys’re detectives then, huh? Do me a favor an’ shoot the sonofabitch when you see ’im.”
    â€œDone that already,” Mike said.
    â€œWhoa! Ya don’t say? Oh, I get it now. This is about that fracas over on Governeur Street the other night. Didn’t know Stolzenthaler got himself shot. Wait a minute,” the cobbler said with a satisfied gleam in his eye. He rummaged behind his workbench and pulled out a flask. “Real Jamaican rum this is. Good stuff. Have a drink wi’ me. Any man shot Stolzenthaler deserves a good drink.”
    Mike was going to refuse, but relented, not wanting to dampen the man’s enthusiasm. He took a good pull at the flask and handed it over to Primo, who took a polite swig and gave it back to the cobbler. The old man held the flask to his mouth with a bent and lumpy hand, emptying it in one long pull. “Damn that’s good! Even better to hear the prick’s got himself plugged.” The cobbler stopped then and squinted at Mike, pursing his lips. “He ain’t dead, is he,” the cobbler said, his mood turning doubtful and somber, “otherwise what’d you be doin’ lookin’ for ’im.”
    Mike shook his head. “Might be dead, might not. Sad to say he was alive when I last saw him.”
    â€œBut you’re sure he’s shot?” the old man said, seeming very anxious on the point.
    â€œSure as I can be.”
    â€œThere is a doctor in the neighborhood he would go to?” Primo asked. “Maybe not a doctor, like a dentist, a nurse maybe?”
    The cobbler scratched his head and winced, then rubbing one hand against the other. “Well, that’s coverin’ a lot o’ ground, see. But what yer really wantin’ ta know is where would a prick like Stolzenthaler go to get stitched up an’ nobody be the wiser.”
    â€œThat’s about it,” Mike said. “Any ideas?”
    â€œThere’s two, maybe three, the gangs use. They ain’t docs though. One was a medic in the war with Spain. The other’s a dentist, sort of. Not sure where he got his trainin’. He’s a terrible drunk. Then there’s a woman’s got lots o’ medical know-how. Been midwifin’ fer years, but she was a nurse in the big war. She’s old now, like me,” he said. “She’d stitch the devil himself fer a dollar. Laudanum addict, cocaine too when she can get it.”
    â€œYou got names and addresses?”
    â€œYou bet. Who ya think fixes their shoes?”
    *   *   *
    The medic proved to be of little use. He was working on a child with what appeared to be a broken leg. The boy was screaming and a crowd of women and children clogged the little tenement office, filling it with a constant babble. The medic, sweating and distracted, shooed Mike and Primo off, saying he hadn’t seen a wounded gangster in at least a week.
    â€œWhadya think?” Mike said as they left.
    â€œWe try the dentist. This one, he’s too busy to lie to us now.”
    â€œProbably,” Mike agreed. He looked at the addresses the cobbler had given them. “That dentist is right down the block.”
    The dentist, a man the