49
Isiah Parker; Atlantic City
ISIAH PARKER HAD registered under a false name at Trump Plaza. Detectives Jimmy Burke and Aurelio Rodriquez were at separate hotels along the boardwalk: Burke was at Bally’s; Rodriquez was up at Resorts International. They were waiting for the final assignment; for a name, or names.
Inside his ocean-view room at Trump’s, Parker unpacked a black leather duffel bag, which held his work clothes and supplies. He checked and cleaned his .22, an N.Y.P.D.-issue revolver. Late in the afternoon, he strapped a lightweight shoulder holster over his shirt. A tan corduroy sports jacket would keep the gun out of sight while he was working downstairs in the hotel.
He was going undercover for one more hit. Who the hell was it supposed to be? Why this secrecy right up to the last minute?
Charles Mackey had promised to contact him after eleven that evening. A dozen high-ranking mob heads were already inside Trump Plaza. They were there because of the recent murders in New York, but also in Palermo, in London, in Hong Kong. Why was he there?
It was easy to blend with the meandering crowd on the glitzy main floor of Trump’s. Parker showed a casual interest in the slots, where he quickly lost a palmful of quarters and dollar slugs. He drifted toward the craps and blackjack tables. Parker stomped around casually, as if he had no place to go, just some guy on a busman’s holiday.
He was pretty sure nobody was paying attention to him. Meanwhile, he had spotted several of Trump’s security detectives. It was a challenge picking them out, one by one, then memorizing the faces.
Parker saw a Hispanic waiter enter a small private elevator on the mezzanine floor. When the empty elevator returned, he stepped inside and took it to the basement.
He knew that the secret to being where you weren’t supposed to be was looking like you belonged. As he roamed past the hotel kitchen, a cart piled with food rattled out of the swinging doors. Parker walked alongside an elderly black waiter, a large, overweight man who swayed from side to side with every step.
“Men’s exercise gym down here somewhere?” he asked the waiter, whose eyes seemed dazed.
“Yes, sir. Men’s and women’s gyms. Keep heading the way you going now. Be on your right.”
“That must be some kind of party upstairs in the penthouse,” Parker continued in a casual tone.
The waiter glanced away from Parker. He stayed quiet for a few shuffling steps, then he started to talk.
“Those gentlemen are spenders, tell you that. Every one of ’em on the comp. You know the comp? Free ride? You better believe they players.”
“The whole place seems to be jumpin’ this weekend.”
“Every day in the summertime. Hey, I got to scoot, man. Don’t look like you need too much exercise.”
Parker laughed, and he stayed alongside the waiter at the service elevators. Now he was pushing his luck a little. He lit up a cigarette.
“Real players upstairs, huh. They frisk you and everything? When you go into that suite? Hey, man, I was in a big game like that one time myself. In Las Vegas. While I was in the army. I was stationed at Fort Sills, Oklahoma.”
“Fort Sills, yeah. They don’t frisk me. They not afraid some old fat man like me. Tip pretty good. Even the guys work for ’em tip good. You ain’t been in no games like this one.”
50
THE ELEVATOR FINALLY arrived and the elderly waiter stepped inside with his food cart. Parker waved nonchalantly. The waiter didn’t bother to wave back.
Isiah Parker turned away from the elevator. He walked down one of several tunnels that ran underneath the hotel. He considered the things he’d already learned walking around Trump’s, and asking questions.
The penthouse suite had its own private elevator, for one thing. The elevators were guarded. The shift change was every two hours, which kept the men fresh. The next change was at twelve. The penthouse had its own wet bar, restocked twice a day. The floor could also be reached by the fire-escape stairway, which was heavily guarded, but might be taken easier than the elevator.
Trump’s was definitely full. Donald Trump had originally bought the Plaza from Harrah’s. He had remodeled for one reason only: to capture the five thousand known heavy rollers who were shared by the Golden Nugget and Caesar’s. The entertainment schedule was upgraded from Norm Crosby / Mitzi Gaynor to Diana Ross / Frank Sinatra. Sixty-five easy-living suites were installed for the high rollers, who expected to be comped and treated like visiting movie stars at the casino-hotel. The syndicate members were high rollers, of course.
Hotel waiters, teams of waiters, had gone up to service the penthouse suite half a dozen times in the last eight hours. What Parker needed to know now was who was he supposed to go after. Which one of the mob overlords was the target?
He wondered who was making the final decision, maybe making it right now.
Just past ten o’clock, Isiah Parker finally ducked out of the hotel. He strolled north along the crowded boardwalk toward where the famous Steel Pier used to be.
He stayed tucked inside the main body of the crowd. Just to be safe. The moon sitting over the ocean was the creamy yellow of butter. It was glowing brightly. The steel gray ripple on the water was beautiful, but he had trouble enjoying the view tonight.
A glossy poster at Bally’s proudly announced that Diana Ross was appearing there on Saturday night. Parker had once idolized her. He’d had the biggest crush on Prissy Miss Diana Ross. Things like that hadn’t mattered to him for a while, though.
The underground police assignment mattered. Parker knew he had been given the job specifically because of his brother’s murder. Charles Mackey and the police commissioner were using him, but at least they were up-front about it.
And now, several important crime lords were gathering in Atlantic City. He was supposed to hit one of them in the next twenty-four hours.
But which one?
And how was he supposed to pull it off?
By the time Parker made it to Resorts International, the last old-fashioned hotel on the boardwalk, his body was beginning to feel numb. He yawned and his jaw creaked, echoing inside his head.
He was about to head back toward Trump’s when Isiah Parker saw something that shook him.
He ducked inside a video game arcade. His body shuddered, and he assumed the worst.
A man he knew by sight, another New York policeman, was heading down the boardwalk from the direction of Trump’s. The man was propped up in a wheelchair, but he was still coming at a pretty good clip.
Lieutenant John Stefanovitch of Homicide was on the boardwalk of Atlantic City. The man investigating the St.-Germain and Oliver Barnwell murders was down here for the weekend. Isiah Parker didn’t think he’d come for the swimming.
51
John Stefanovitch; The Tropicana
STEFANOVITCH HAD TAKEN a half-hour sanity break from the surveillance watch inside the Tropicana. He’d gone out on the boardwalk to clear his head, but also to satisfy his curiosity about what the new Atlantic City looked like.
Twenty minutes after his trip down the boardwalk, Stefanovitch was back inside the Tropicana. He was moderately refreshed, ready to wait and watch nothing happen some more. He changed into a fresh shirt, spritzed on some cologne, and waited. Always the waiting.
The hotel suite in the Tropicana resembled a political headquarters after either a disastrous election result, or an equally problematic celebration. The regular furniture had all been pushed back away from the windows. A lot of real functional stuff like chrome torchére lamps, sectional couches, glass cocktail tables, was stacked against two of the walls.
FBI men with high-powered binoculars and opera glasses were slumped in a row of dining room chairs, observing the penthouse across the way at Trump’s. Used coffee cups and greasy sandwich wrappers were thrown everywhere, mostly just dropped on the floor near chairs.
The FBI men weren’t just idly observing the penthouse suites at Trump’s. Motion-picture and still cameras, b
ut also sensitive directional microphones, were being used to record the syndicate meeting from every angle. None of the really important business had begun. A group of high crime over-lords wasn’t expected until the following morning, including the heir apparent from Europe, and the King of Kings in the Orient, who lived in Macao.
Stefanovitch had returned to his spot behind one of the gray-tinted picture windows. He slipped on a pair of bulky black earphones, and began to listen to more gangster conversation over in the penthouse.
Stakeouts are among the worst experiences in police life, he was thinking as he listened to overlapping electronic blips and snippets of conversation. You sat, and you waited. You began to feel as if you were physically turning into some kind of cold stone pillar. Only this time—maybe—it was going to be a little different.
In theory at least, the Atlantic City stakeout was a dream come true for the police. It was as if the situation had been set up for them, just for the purpose of listening in at the very top of the criminal underworld.
In a way, it was too good, and that worried Stefanovitch. It concerned David Wilkes of the FBI, too. It probably disturbed every tuned-in agent or officer in the surveillance room.
The Midnight Club was meeting across Texas Avenue. They were eighty, maybe a hundred yards away. It was almost as if it had been set up for the police to come and listen. Why, though? It didn’t track.
Stefanovitch listened with his eyes shut. There was the sound of all these strange, guttural voices drifting over to him. Weird.
Finally, he pulled the earphones off, letting them rest around his neck.
Something was bothering him a lot. He couldn’t figure out what. Something about the setup in Atlantic City didn’t feel right to him.
Maybe because it seemed like such a perfect setup. The thing with Nicky Wilson at Danbury? It was too good, too neat, like prearranged fighting in a police academy class.
And then Stefanovitch realized when he had felt something like this before. Just one time. The same uncomfortable intuitions—with his pulse seeming to beat right through his skin.
He had felt almost exactly like this. That freezing March night at Long Beach, minutes before the ambush.
52
Sarah McGinniss; The Tropicana
SARAH RODE BY herself in the lumpy backseat of a police department sedan. The car was a light blue Buick, and it was transporting her from Manhattan down to Atlantic City. She had to see the end, to witness Appalachia II, as the operation was called at Police Plaza.
Around ten-thirty P.M., the sedan entered the boardwalk area of Atlantic City. The car headed up glittery Pacific Avenue.
There was a quick turnoff past Brighton; then the sedan maneuvered around concrete pillars at very close quarters. It stopped at a littered, dingy service and delivery entrance behind the Tropicana.
One of the detectives in the front seat jumped out. He dashed around to open the door for Sarah. Chivalry was still alive in the N.Y.P.D.
“I’m really sorry about this unnecessary bullshit. The service entrance.” He shrugged and shook his head. “They’re afraid somebody might recognize you.”
“I understand, Frank,” she said. “This isn’t the first time I’ve used the service entrance at a hotel. It probably won’t be the last. Thanks for the ride, and the company.”
Sarah was hurried upstairs in a service elevator. She didn’t mind bypassing the potted palm trees and artificial blue waterfall in the lobby of the Tropicana. Maybe some other visit.
David Wilkes left a clique of gray-suits to greet her as she entered the surveillance suite. As she shook hands with the FBI man, Sarah spotted Stefanovitch.
He was wearing a set of black earphones, watching Trump’s like a knowledgeable player at the racetrack. He really looked in his element.
Sarah had met David Wilkes twice before, while she was researching The Club. She’d written two chapters about his Crimes Committee, and she liked Wilkes. He had absolutely no bullshit about him.
As she talked to Wilkes, Sarah checked out the scene. Across the street, inside Trump’s, she could make out movement. It was almost as if the two groups were preparing to meet for some as yet unexplained reason.
“The windows are made of reflective glass in the suites here. That’s one reason we picked this place. They can’t see us. We’re using high-powered directional mikes, so they won’t find any bugs over there either. So far, so good.”
“It’s eerie being allowed to watch something you know you shouldn’t be watching.”
“So far, everything’s working out better than I would have expected. We were able to get the best listening equipment. Everything’s too good.”
Sarah finally pointed across the room. “I see somebody I know over there. A friend of mine. I’m going to say hello to the lieutenant.”
“All right. I wouldn’t admit to knowing that deadbeat character, though.”
53
A MOMENT LATER, Sarah came up behind Stefanovitch. She lifted the earphones off his head.
“Are you the one who got me the personal invite down here to see this? If you are, I just wanted to thank you.”
Stefanovitch slowly swiveled around. He was smiling, for a change.
“The scribe has arrived. I guess we can start now. Pull up a card table chair. You can sit here and watch the Midnight Club in action. This is the way it really is on a stakeout.”
Sarah picked up one of the nearby chairs. She brought it over next to Stefanovitch.
“This is the real thing, huh?”
“Well, they’re all here. This must be the Club. Tino Deluna from Miami. Ten Hsu-shire from Hong Kong. Daniel Steinberg from London and Paris. All the biggies in the mob. What comes next, I do not know.”
Sarah quickly discovered that “surveillance” was just another word for Chinese water torture. For the first time, she understood what a police stakeout was about. After three and a half hours of sitting, occasionally listening in on the most banal and disgusting conversations at Trump’s, she couldn’t take any more.
She wandered around the Tropicana suite. Sarah went and talked to David Wilkes again. She came back to Stef and discussed everything from real-life godfathers to the night he’d seen the diving horse on the old Steel Pier, one of the unforgettable moments of his youth. “Family entertainment, back when there used to be families,” Stefanovitch said.
Sarah got better at surveillance—at listening, at concentrating—but a little past three, she decided to put her head down on one of the cots in the adjoining suite. Stefanovitch had taken another two-hour turn. He seemed to be getting nourishment out of what he was hearing over at Trump’s. He was an insomniac, anyway, at least he had been since the night of the shootings at Long Beach.
As he sat behind the reflective picture windows in the Tropicana, Stefanovitch pointed the directional mike this way and that. The bosses didn’t seem to be talking about anything worth recording. His attention went wandering again. Something was still bothering him about the meeting.
Around four in the morning, Sarah reappeared. She touched Stefanovitch’s shoulder, and he turned.
She was wrapped in a brown hotel blanket, looking lazy and comfortable. Images from her beach house filtered back.
“Don’t you ever sleep?” she asked. Her eyes were still glassy and damp from her nap.
Stefanovitch shook his head. “Not tonight.”
“I don’t know. Everything looks so quiet over there now.”
“Most of the gentlemen who run organized crime around the world are there. How quiet can it be?”
Over in the penthouse, a session was developing among four or five of the bosses. They had traveled from different time zones, and apparently needed to stay awake to avoid jet lag.
Stefanovitch shuffled through a deck of photographs. Each picture was marked on the back with a name and brief profile.
One of the soldiers at Trump’s crossed in front of a window. The man stopped walking suddenly. He
had an oversized walrus mustache, a little like the TV host Gene Shalit’s, only the soldier’s deeply pocked face wasn’t particularly friendly.
Walrusman seemed to be staring directly across at the Tropicana. He was looking right about where Stefanovitch and Sarah sat.
“He can’t see us,” Stefanovitch whispered. Still, the soldier did seem to be staring at them.
“He sees something. I wonder what’s going on inside all their heads? They’re the ones being shot at.”
“I can’t work up too much sympathy.”
Stefanovitch yawned, and he shook his head. Now he was getting tired. Right at the start of his watch.
“Why don’t you go lie down?” Sarah said. “I’ll sit out here for you. Go ahead. I’m up now.”
“Looks like they’re pulling all-nighters, too. They ordered more food,” Stefanovitch said and yawned again. “My grandfather used to call men like that crumb-bums. Now they rule the world. The crumb-bums.”
Over inside the penthouse, a couple of hotel waiters in white half jackets appeared. They carried the usual silver trays, which helped keep room-service food so consistently soggy.
The waiters were followed by the same soldier who had been standing at the picture window. The return of Walrus-man.
“It’s funny the way you begin to feel a kind of identification with people you watch on surveillance,” Stefanovitch grinned.
“Yeah, I could really identify with some breakfast right now. I missed dinner. Ham and eggs! Mmm-mmm good. What is that other stuff there? Lox? That looks so-o-o good.”
The hotel waiters were efficiently setting out the contents from their trays. Room-service guys loved to do that. Tray tops off. Little red rose in a vase.
Stefanovitch remembered that he hadn’t eaten himself. Crime did pay. A scene from The French Connection flashed through his mind—Gene Hackman, standing outside in the cold, watching some fancy French restaurant in Manhattan, while Frog One and his pal sat inside, eating everything in sight.