Episode 65 - Who Did This? Who's Behind It?
"My body feels heavy today."
Herman Kalman tilted his head from side to side and shook out his hands. He felt sore and stiff, even though he'd slept well through the night. He wasn't in good shape.
"Maybe I'm just too stressed out."
At times like this, he had his own way of dealing with it—taking out his stress on his employees always made him feel refreshed.
Orchard Street was bustling with people from early morning. Kalman got out of the carriage some distance away and headed down the street toward his company.
"What's going on? Why are all those people gathered?"
Was there something to see?
They weren't blocking anyone else's business, but a crowd had gathered outside his own.
Kalman pushed his way through the throng and climbed the stairs.
And then—
Bang!
Herman Kalman, arriving for work, kicked open the factory's iron doors.
He couldn't believe what he saw.
Dozens of sewing machines were gone, and the stacks of fabric in the corner had vanished without a trace. The entire second floor was completely empty.
"What the... what on earth happened here!"
His voice grew louder and louder, until he was practically screaming.
"Get out of my way!"
The workers, who should have started up the sewing machines early that morning, stood there wearing glum expressions.
Kalman roughly pushed them aside and stormed up to the third floor.
There, just like the second floor, everything was completely empty—except for four guards standing around, their faces swollen and bruised.
"You... you idiots!"
Herman Kalman ran over and punched one of them in the face. Then he kicked him, and, not satisfied with that, he grabbed a broom from the floor and beat him with the handle without mercy.
"Die! Die, you worthless bastards!"
Once Kalman finally calmed down after his violent outburst, he noticed the workers staring at him with gloomy faces.
"What are you looking at, you bitches? Get downstairs!"
"...What about our pay...?"
"Shut up! You've got the nerve to talk about wages after what happened here!? Fucking hell."
The terrified workers, their eyes rimmed with fear and tears, ranged from teenage girls to ajummas in their forties. All of them were suddenly faced with the threat of losing their jobs and their pay.
A short while later Herman Kalman gnashed his teeth as he stared into the empty safe.
The guards, their faces even more swollen than before, hunched over and bowed their heads.
Kalman steadied his breathing, his eyes flashing viciously.
"Call the police right now, and tell Chuck and Louis Fioji that I want to see them."
Chuck Ruger was the boss of the Orchard Street Gang.
Louis Fioji was a fellow gang member from their days together in the Five Points Gang.
Would the police ever be able to recover the stolen goods? Kalman decided it would be faster to mobilize the gangs than to rely on the police.
Separately, to solve his suddenly frozen cash flow, he headed for the Chesterkirk Company, a loan agency on Broadway and Fulton Street.
***
137 Allen Street.
On the newly renovated and neatly tidied basement floor, men gathered.
Patrick and Jeffrey, both in their thirties, had been leading the Marginals since the very beginning alongside Tanner.
The young bloods: Oliver, Brian, and Kale.
Nox, Tanner—they made up the real inner circle of the Marginals.
Sitting idle in the empty space, Oliver rubbed his temple.
"Man, shit. My head's still ringing."
"It's because the paint smell won't go away. That, or you're still not fully recovered from that beating last time."
"Shut up. You got beat up just like I did."
"Hey, you two, sit apart. Why do you always sit together if you're always fighting?"
As Oliver and Brian started growling at each other, Patrick waved his hand with an annoyed look on his face.
At that moment, someone was coming down the stairs.
It was the boss, Nox, his face hidden by a scarf.
Nox glanced around at the walls, checking the finishing work, and sniffed the air.
Soon enough, he, too, was rubbing his temple.
"My head is pounding."
Brian, itching to say something, started to open his mouth, but everyone shook their heads.
Nox sat down with the group and spoke up.
"I don't know if everyone's heard, but we're going to turn the first and second basement floors here into a bar and a casino."
The first floor would be a clothing shop, and the floors above that were planned as offices and lodging for the Marginals and the Union.
"Oh, and from now on, don't all come into the building together in a crowd. Be mindful—nobody should know who we are or that there's a gang here."
Nox's gaze passed from one person to another, finally stopping at Patrick.
"What about the stolen goods?"
"We already sold off the fabric, and we've got ten guys working on just touching up the sewing machines so they don't stand out."
They'd stolen sixty-seven Stinger Sewing Machines.
Since they planned to use them again, they were carefully altering the exteriors so no one would notice.
Nox pulled five thick envelopes out of his bag and held them out.
"This is your pay for this job. Since we worked in teams, each team leader gets $60, and each team member gets $40. Make sure it gets divided up properly."
It was about $4,000 in total. Since the stolen goods were going to be used in Mother's company instead of being sold, Nox paid this out of his own pocket.
Part of it was covered with money taken from Herman Kalman's safe, but disappointingly, there had only been $400 in there.
Still, maybe because they'd just received a month's wages for an average worker, the members couldn't help but grin.
Even though they'd banded together under the Marginals name, up until now, everyone had simply been getting by on their own. It was rare for them to do a job as a group and split the profits like this.
Some saw this as the beginning of something new.
So, what was the next step?
Everyone's eyes fixed on Nox's mouth, waiting for him to speak.
"Since we've raided the boss's honey pot, it's time to tighten the pressure for real. Jeffrey, today you're going to reach out to the Bunny Underwear workers."
For a boss suddenly starved of funds, the most urgent problem would be workers demanding their wages.
"Kalman's sure to try using violence to put them down, so we have to support the workers."
Jeffrey, one of the earliest gang members along with Tanner, had a ton of experience stirring up union strikes—in other words, he'd had his share of Slugger work.
While he was never as famous as some of the bigger names—Johnny Spanish, Kid Dropper Naplan, or Rosenzweig—his experience was just as impressive.
There'd even been a saying that wherever there was a strike, that was Jeffrey's second home.
Of course, that was all in the past.
So, what can we actually do now For now, we just keep going as far as we can. Wouldn't it be a shame to end things here
If it hadn't been for Patrick's words, Jeffrey, now in his thirties, would have left the gang.
A new boss, a new gang.
Feeling alienated during this time of great upheaval, he'd been planning to say goodbye to the gangster life.
But now, the new boss was asking him to take on the exact kind of Slugger work that marked the beginning of the Marginals.
Something hot welled up deep inside Jeffrey's chest.
"Leave it to me, Boss!"
"Take whoever you need."
"Okay!"
Next up were Oliver and Kale.
"You two, go visit the suppliers Kalman owes money to."
"Oh, wait, are we collecting the debts for them?"
"You can set the fee yourselves, but don't overdo it. The main point is to put the squeeze on Kalman."
Oliver and Kale let out a short laugh—not in a bad way, but from genuine admiration.
Pressure him with wage demands as workers, and hit him for overdue payments as a supplier. If Kalman didn't have cash set aside, he'd have no choice but to sell off the building.
The variable here was the money Kalman had stashed away.
Another team was already at work figuring out how to deal with that.
***
A high-end residential area near East 6th Avenue.
Cory and the other members were circling around Kalman's house, keeping watch.
"So, the kids left for school in the morning, and his wife went to the department store. There's only one housekeeper left at home."
"If we just handle the housekeeper, daytime would be best, right?"
"Let's see if they follow the same routine tomorrow."
At the same time,
Leo and Marcus were tailing Herman Kalman.
They started on Orchard Street and followed him all the way to where Fulton Street met Broadway.
But they lost track of him when Kalman disappeared into a tall building with a spire.
"Where the hell is he going?"
"Let's go in after him, just in case."
Leo and Marcus casually entered the building. Marcus glanced at the sign on the side, which read Mail and Express, his eyes lighting up.
"This is a newspaper building."
"Which paper?"
"The Evening Mail. A few years back, Mail and Express changed its name to that."
"You sure know a lot of random stuff."
Marcus lowered his voice and spoke.
"It's a German-backed newspaper. Even now, they shamelessly side with the German Empire."
"What, does that make them spies or something?"
"Keep your voice down, man. But honestly, I kind of suspect them myself."
The thing Marcus hated most was people pretending to be neutral while actually taking sides.
That's exactly what the Evening Mail Newspaper does.
They criticize American media for siding only with England and not staying neutral, yet in reality, they blatantly support Germany.
Marcus likes Swab, the New York World reporter who wrote 'Inside the German Empire.' He criticizes the problems in Germany from an objective point of view.
On the other hand, the Evening Mail stirs up German immigrants and spreads propaganda to justify the war.
"If even I'm suspicious enough to notice, you can bet Intelligence knows everything. Anyway, once the war is over, this paper will be the first to go under."
"Alright, enough of that. Let's check which companies are in this building. There's no way a boss who just got all his merchandise stolen would be coming to a newspaper office."
It wasn't hard to find out which companies were in the building. A directory was laid out right next to the elevator.
As Marcus had said, the upper floors were used by the Evening Mail, and below that, there were a bunch of smaller businesses. And it was only after reading the small print under the names that they could guess where Kalman had gone.
"There are five loan offices in this building. Kalman definitely went to one of them."
"Looks like he needed somewhere to get cash fast."
"Whatever it is, the boss's plan is working out easier than we thought, huh?"
"You're calling him 'boss' like it's the most natural thing now."
At Leo's comment, Marcus nodded seriously.
"I told you. I'm sticking with Ciaran—or rather, Nox—till the end. He's the real boss now."
"I know, idiot. I've been calling him boss for days already. Anyway, let's wait outside."
"Okay."
Leo and Marcus waited in front of the Main Express Building every day for Kalman to come out.
***
Basement level one, 137 Allen Street. Only Patrick and I stayed behind in the basement to discuss something else.
"Now that we've opened up the wall, it's definitely more spacious. A bar, a casino... Just the cost of renovations alone will be significant."
"There's a lot of money that needs to go into this. By the way, I noticed there are women on the Marginals roster too."
"They're all clamoring to meet the boss, you know."
"······"
Most members of the gang are men. Of course, there are women too, but their roles are different from the men's. This was something I was curious about.
"What kind of activities do they mostly do?"
"In this world, you could say there are two types of women. There are girl gangsters—tougher than some men—or 'molls'. Out of the 154 total members of the Marginals, fifteen are women. Among them, five are girl gangsters, and ten are molls.
"Do the girl gangsters fight alongside the men?"
"Haven't you heard of Battle Annie?"
"Oh, I've heard that name."
I'd heard it in both my past and present lives.
The queen of Hell's Kitchen.
The female boss of the Lady Gopher Gang, active for about twenty years now.
I heard she was a female Slugger who intervened in the labor union strike and was especially good at throwing bricks.
"That's right. I almost died from getting hit, too. She throws those things like a maniac."
"…So?"
"Maybe because of Battle Annie's influence, a lot more women have joined gangs since then. They're all just as dangerous as the men."
"What about the girlfriends?"
"They're basically support."
Mainly, they provide safe houses and shelters for getaways, or handle medical support if there's violence.
"Are they all working on something right now?"
"I'm sure they're doing something. Are you thinking of hiring them here as staff?"
"There's no need to look elsewhere, right?"
Patrick agreed with me, saying it was a good idea. But I was in more of a hurry for something else than the bar.
"I'm thinking of opening a clothing store on the first floor. Do you know anyone suitable?"
"What are you going to sell? Oh, underwear?"
At first, I thought of Leo or Marcus.
But honestly, it seems like it would be hard to sell even one a day.
Women's underwear should really be sold by a woman.
"Ida might be a good fit. She's a bit rough around the edges, but her looks and the way she talks make her seem really educated."
"In reality, is she?"
"Not at all. Never even set foot in a school. Damn, can you believe that, in this day and age of mandatory education? Anyway, she was one of the two girls Battle Annie was super protective of. She may not know much else, but she's really good at memorizing things."
The Lady Gopher Gang shared the same fate as the Gopher Gang. After rapidly falling apart starting in the 1910s, they're now all scattered, leaving not even a name behind.
They all either joined other gangs or returned to ordinary lives. I heard that Marginals made a special effort to recruit Ida as a valuable member.
And the reason?
Nothing complicated.
They hired her just because she was pretty.
"I guess I'll need to interview her soon."
With the basement repairs and painting finished, the only thing left was building the Secret Passage up to the first floor.
It was time for the Gunsmith to step in.
***
Bunny Underwear on Orchard Street.
Three days had passed since the place was stripped clean, but nothing had changed. The factory remained empty, and there wasn't a single worker in sight.
The only small relief was that the office desk and sofa were still there. No one had bothered with the heavy, worthless items that wouldn't fetch any money anyway.
"Those bastards. If I ever get my hands on them, I'll tear them apart—"
Just then, as Herman Kalman was jabbing his pencil angrily into some paper, the guard who had failed to stop the raid showed up with a letter.
"What is it this time?"
"…It's a certified letter."
"Are you kidding me? Just rip it up, you idiot. Why do you bring it in here just to piss me off?"
"…It's not just from the patent attorney—four law offices have sent letters too."
There were several envelopes.
Kalman scowled and flicked his finger.
He tossed the stubbornly persistent patent attorney's certified mail straight into the trash, then roughly tore open one of the letters from a defense attorney's office and skimmed through it.
Soon after, Kalman's cheeks started to tremble with rage.
"Damn it… Have they all lost their minds together? They're threatening to sue me if I don't pay their wages?"
The workers had sent legal notices through defense attorneys. With a sneer, Kalman opened another letter.
This time, it was a payment demand from one of his suppliers, insisting on late payments. As if they'd coordinated, three different vendors had sent notices at the same time.
"Those bastards. Like a pack of hyenas. They all think I'm dead already!"
Ha! Sometimes when you're furious, all you can do is laugh—and that's exactly what Kalman did. His deranged laughter echoed through the empty factory.
But he would never go under.
He had already put the building up as collateral. The loan sharks would send over fresh funds by the end of the day.
With that money, he'd bring in new sewing machines and pay off the fabric suppliers, buying himself some breathing room.
Paying the workers would be the very last priority. He'd only do that when everything else was back to normal.
That was Kalman's plan.
"You think I'm just going to roll over and die?!"
Bang!
Just as he slammed his fist down on the desk, another guard who had failed his job burst breathlessly into the office.
"The workers have gathered outside… It looks like those lunatics hired Sluggers!"
"Those crazy women have completely lost their minds. Go give this money to Chuck Ruger and tell him to send some of his boys over."
"Uh, got it."
The subordinate dashed out of the office, and Kalman gritted his teeth. But before long, another group outright stormed into the building.
"Hey, who the hell are you barging in here like this?"
"We're here to collect. Move aside if you don't want trouble."
"If you use our goods, you'd better pay for them, right, Boss Kalman?!"
A dozen or so people charged into the office. One group was led by a giant whose head almost touched the ceiling; the other, the exact opposite—a small but sharp-eyed little guy led his own crowd.
They were enforcers sent by different suppliers.
Seeing them, Kalman's face darkened with a heavy scowl.
Pressure was closing in from all sides, as if a dam had burst.
There was no doubt that someone had orchestrated this—deliberately, and with a plan. Otherwise, how could all this happen at the exact same time.
Kalman, biting his lip hard enough to draw blood, glared at his adversaries.
"Who is it? Who set this up?"
Kale folded his arms, while Oliver grinned, tapping an iron pipe against the floor.
"Shut up. If you don't have the money, face down on the desk. We'll smash you up starting from the right."
Just as Oliver took a step forward, suddenly, chaos erupted outside the building.
Screams, curses, and the thud of heavy blows mingled into a wild uproar.
Reinforcements for Herman Kalman had arrived just in time. With the Orchard Street Gang entering the fray, the situation flipped.
"Let's see who's got more men. Bring it on."
The counterattack had begun. Kalman's mouth curled into a crooked smile.