Chapter 7 - THE THIRD CYLINDER
Tommy always liked threes.
Three knocks meant me.
Three coins in his pocket before a Navy exam.
Three sugar cubes in coffee when he could get them.
I should have thought of it.
One cylinder in my radio.
One at Pier 46.
One somewhere connected to our childhood.
Margaret asked:
“What was the safest place Thomas knew?”
I thought of our parents’ old apartment in Hell’s Kitchen.
Gone.
The repair shop.
Closed.
Church basement.
Too obvious.
Then I remembered the first thing Tommy ever fixed for me.
A music box.
Cheap tin.
Painted blue.
Our father bought it from a street vendor when I turned seven.
It played only six notes before jamming.
Tommy repaired it repeatedly for years.
After our mother died, I kept it in a drawer.
When I moved to West 109th Street, Tommy carried it himself.
My blood ran cold.
“My apartment.”
Lucardi said:
“We already searched the radio.”
“Not the radio.”
“The music box.”
Walter groaned.
“It’s still there?”
“I think so.”
We returned before four.
The apartment looked even worse.
The music box sat in my bedroom dresser.
Untouched.
I opened it.
The song stumbled through six tinny notes.
Lucardi waited.
I removed the inner tray.
Nothing.
Then I remembered Tommy had repaired the winding key.
I twisted it backward.
A tiny brass sleeve loosened.
Inside:
Another cylinder.
Margaret exhaled.
“Thomas.”
I broke the seal.
Inside was no paper.
Just a piece of photographic film rolled tightly.
Lucardi held it toward the lamp.
Microfilm.
We needed enlargement equipment.
Margaret knew a newspaper photographer who kept a darkroom in the building.
By 4:40 a.m., we had images.
Cargo schedules.
Maps.
One target circled repeatedly.
BROOKLYN NAVY YARD — DRY DOCK 4
A repair yard full of ships and workers.
A second page:
05:30 — MATERIAL ENTERS VIA SANITATION TRUCK
Lucardi checked his watch.
Fifty minutes.
Margaret grabbed the telephone.
Walter said:
“Who are you calling?”
“Edwin’s office.”
“If Pryce controls it, you’ll warn him.”
She froze.
Lucardi said:
“We need someone outside Pryce’s chain.”
Margaret looked at him.
“Who?”
Salvatore hesitated.
Then smiled without humor.
“I know one honest cop.”
Walter laughed.
“That is the most unbelievable thing said all night.”
Lucardi ignored him.
But I looked at the final microfilm frame.
There was another note.
Handwritten by Tommy.
IF PRYCE IS EXPOSED, CHECK LUCA’S MAN ANGELO.
I looked up slowly.
One of Lucardi’s two men was named Angelo.
The taller one.
He had been with us since my apartment.
He was not in the room now.
“Where’s Angelo?”
Lucardi turned.
His expression went empty.
The second man, Vincent, looked toward the hallway.
“He went downstairs.”
“When?”
“Five minutes ago.”
Lucardi ran.
So did we.
The rear door was open.
One car was missing.
Walter whispered:
“Sanitation truck.”
Lucardi turned on him.
“What?”
“Angelo has a city sanitation permit through one of your shell companies.”
Salvatore’s face drained.
Everything Tommy wrote made sense.
Pryce was compromised.
Vale may have been trying to stop him.
But someone inside Lucardi’s operation had been helping move materials.
Angelo.
A trusted man with access to trucks, docks and forged permits.
Lucardi closed his eyes for half a second.
This was personal.
“How long has he worked for you?” I asked.
“Twelve years.”
“Family?”
“My godson.”
That one hurt him.
Good.
Maybe now he understood what Tommy carried.
Lucardi grabbed his coat.
“We go now.”
Margaret said:
“Police?”
“We call from the road.”
I looked at the clock.
4:46.
Forty-four minutes.
May you like
Brooklyn felt a continent away.
And somewhere ahead of us, a man Tommy had suspected was driving toward a naval yard with something hidden inside a sanitation truck.
