I had one day to get Leo through that door, and the only man I knew who might make Frank afraid to keep it shut had troubles of his own. The newspapers carried the news of Capone's February contempt conviction and a six-month sentence. I read the account outside a drugstore, holding the paper against the wind. It concerned a federal proceeding, not our truck or Leo's disappearance. I folded it before going to ask for help. Nothing printed there gave me a right to expect any.
An acquaintance let me wait where I had sometimes collected driving assignments. I stood rather than take a chair. Men crossed the room with coats over their arms, busy with matters nobody explained to me. When Capone finally came through, I stepped into his path far enough to be noticed and no farther. 'I need five minutes.' He looked at my torn coat, then at the man beside him. I was shown into a smaller room where a radiator knocked behind an empty desk.
I told him Frank had Leo confined and that Paul had kept me from the door. I described hearing Leo answer. Capone sat with his hat on his knee. 'You were supposed to quiet this down.' I said I had tried to settle the truck, not bargain over a man. He asked what I wanted from him. The answer I had rehearsed on the walk suddenly sounded larger in that room. I wanted him to make Frank release Leo, and I wanted Frank to know I would not stand alone afterward.
'What have you promised?' he asked. I said Leo would come out without Bruno surrendering anything first. Capone rubbed the brim of his hat. 'Then that's your promise.' I moved closer to the desk. I reminded him that he had chosen me to speak at the yard. He answered that I had been chosen to arrange a settlement, not pledge his name to whatever followed. He did not tell me what Frank had done or what Paul deserved. He gave me no explanation I could carry back as authority.
I could still have narrowed my promise. I could have offered to leave Leo inside while the money and the truck were argued over again. Instead I said, 'He comes out free to walk away.' Capone rose. 'Don't tell them I'm behind that.' There was no shouting. The absence of it made the words harder to mistake. I had come hoping to borrow weight from a name. I left knowing that if I spoke it at the garage, I would be lying.
The car assigned to me stood outside with a little road salt whitening its running board. I drove it back to the place where the keys were kept and parked between two other automobiles. The attendant asked when I wanted it again. 'I don't.' He held out his hand, and I put the keys into it before I could invent a final errand. My medical advance for Rose had long since been worked off. There was no unpaid favor to argue about, only a habit of believing gratitude required another year.
I walked toward Cicero with my collar raised. Once, at a crossing, I reached into my pocket for keys that were no longer there. My own old car waited behind my lodging house, but I kept walking. Taking it to Frank's would have given him something else to hold, and I needed to think before I let another possession enter that yard. A streetcar rattled past with faces bright in its windows. I had enough coins for the fare. I saved them without yet knowing what for.
Paul met me at the garage gate before dusk. I told him Capone would not stand behind my promise. Something eased in his face, and seeing it hurt worse than his shove the night before. 'Then bring money,' he said. I asked whether Leo had food and water. Paul said he did. I made him open the workroom far enough for me to call. Leo answered again. I could not see him, but his answer kept the place from becoming merely a door I might turn away from.
Frank came out and named his price for opening it. He called the sum repairs, storage, and trouble. I called it a demand for a man's freedom. We stood there with Paul's shoulder against the jamb. Frank would not lower it. I counted what I had in my pocket, though I knew it was useless. To raise the amount before Bruno's deadline, I would have to sell the one car that still belonged to me.