Border City Blues 3-Book Bundle. Michael Januska
speaking, though, the world wasn’t scheduled to end for another three months. July 19, 1921 — that’s when the new legislation would come into effect. From that day forward, not only would it be illegal to manufacture liquor for sale within Ontario, it would be illegal to import it as well. There was still time to stock up.
McCloskey was in a downtown pool hall going through the mechanics of his left hook with his new friends from the plant when someone came in with the afternoon edition of the Border Cities Star and began reading bits out loud. McCloskey remembered being in Cleveland when Prohibition hit the States. The general feeling then was that folks would just have to get their booze from across the lake. Now both sides would be more or less dry and a solution would require a little creative thinking.
Further reading revealed the date for the upcoming Dempsey-Carpentier championship fight. The focus of the conversation immediately shifted back to boxing, with brief asides on the seating capacity of a Studebaker Big Six and the best route to Jersey City.
Then the room fell silent. McCloskey noticed everyone suddenly looking past him and some then retreating into the shadows.
“You like Dempsey?”
There were a few, especially among American veterans, who still thought of his hero as a slacker. McCloskey turned slowly, expecting a challenge. It was a suit. The man filling it out was not as tall as McCloskey, but broader. His nose was pressed against his face and a scar intersected his left eyebrow. His jaw resembled a truck fender. McCloskey figured the guy had to have been a fighter, probably twenty years and as many pounds ago.
“You’re Killer McCloskey, aren’t you?”
“I might be.”
The man smiled and under the brim of his hat his squinty, deep-set eyes twinkled like diamonds at the bottom of a mineshaft.
“That was something the other night,” he said. “I mean the floor shook when that dago hit the mat.”
McCloskey wondered what he was after. Judging by the reaction of the boys in the pool hall, it wasn’t an autograph. McCloskey played it down.
“It was no big deal.”
Actually, it was a big deal. Little did McCloskey know, but his win had made the man in the suit a tidy sum of money and had nearly ruined a number of his rival bookies in Detroit.
“C’mon. I’ll buy you a drink. Not here — I’ve got a little place around the corner.”
Apparently, the man had come to talk business. He said his name was Green. Later on McCloskey heard some other fellows refer to him as the Lieutenant.
— Chapter 3 —
THE LIEUTENANT
It was getting late and the stragglers were heading home to flop. Green walked McCloskey around the corner to a diner on Pitt Street next to the Department of Soldiers’ Civil Re-establishment. Green picked through his key ring while McCloskey pressed his nose against the window. What he saw didn’t look like much.
“No — over here.”
Green was unlocking a plain-looking door to the right of the diner entrance. On the door was a small plaque that said “International Billiards — MEMBERS ONLY.”
The door opened to a narrow stairwell lit by a bare bulb hanging over the landing. McCloskey walked in Green’s shadow all the way up. On the landing and to the right they were confronted with an even heavier door that had a covered peephole the height and width of a pair of eyes. Green jangled his keys again, poked the locks, and swung it open.
The room was pitch black except for a bit of light in the windows overlooking the street below. Before stepping inside, Green reached around the doorframe and finger-punched a couple switches on the wall.
From the copper ceiling hung globe lights that illuminated a bunch of tables and cane chairs arranged haphazardly between the entrance and the bar. To the right were five billiard tables standing side by side. A big skylight punctured the ceiling above the centre table. Blinds covered every window except the ones along back that faced a brick wall in the alleyway.
It was first-class but not fancy, all oak and polished brass with spittoons on the floor instead of sawdust. Green could tell McCloskey was impressed. He let McCloskey take it all in and then pointed with his chin towards a room jutting out from the far corner.
“My office,” said Green.
He went in ahead of McCloskey and pulled the chain on a desk lamp. He shuffled some papers into a pile, removed his bowler hat and set it on top.
“Take a load off.”
McCloskey lowered himself into one of the matching wooden armchairs that faced the desk. Green offered him a cigar from a humidor that looked like a small treasure chest.
“Thanks.”
On a little table that stood between the two chairs was a metal contraption for snipping off one end of a cigar and lighting the other. It looked like it had been made in a machine shop out of spare engine parts. McCloskey put it to work and got the tip of the Cuban glowing. It was nice. Green poured some brown liquid into tumblers while McCloskey surveyed the room. Trophies lined a mantle and photos of boxers in their fighting stance hung on the wall. One of the pugilists was unmistakably Green.
“That was a long time ago.”
He handed McCloskey one of the tumblers and then settled into his chair. The leather groaned beneath him and he stole a puff from his cigar.
“If you don’t mind my asking, how much money you make last year dropping palookas like the Volcano?”
McCloskey told him.
Green gave a gravelly laugh then paused for dramatic effect. “How’d you like to make that in one fight?”
McCloskey nearly swallowed his cigar.
“Seriously — I’ve got money and connections. As far as I can tell that’s all you need to take a fighter to the next level.”
“You a promoter?” asked McCloskey.
Green leaned forward. “Not exactly. But I got what it takes, and so do you.”
He was trying to grab the wheel from McCloskey, and it made McCloskey a little uncomfortable.
“Whoa, I like money just as much as the next guy, but let’s be honest here — I’m no boxer. I’m just a fighter, and if you’re looking for someone to go the long haul with you’re a few years too late with me.”
“How old are you?”
“Twenty-six.”
Green waved a dismissive hand. “Forget about that.”
He got up and perched on the edge of his desk. His movements were always slow and deliberate. He was a man that didn’t hurry for anyone.
“You got fire in you,” he said, pointing at McCloskey with his cigar. “I can see that. All it needs is a little refinement.”
What Green also saw in McCloskey was his second, albeit vicarious, chance at achieving boxing greatness. He had missed his first opportunity after getting shot up in the Transvaal. He had come limping home from South Africa with no prospects and ended up doing time in the streets or the jails of Montreal. Another war came along, but this time the army wouldn’t have him, so he started looking for the big payoff, a caper that would set him up really nice. As luck would have it Prohibition arrived in the States and created a world of opportunities. He signed on with a smuggling syndicate and got shipped down to Windsor to secure a territory along the border opposite Detroit. Green was the Montreal boss’s first lieutenant. He’d done well for himself but his heart was still in the ring. Seeing McCloskey drop the Volcano was like rekindling an old flame.
He got down to brass tacks. More chit-chat followed, but before long Green was through talking and there was one last dramatic pause.